Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research
      Moz Pro

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research

      Try it free!
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Technical SEO
    4. 301 for "index.php" in Web.config?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    301 for "index.php" in Web.config?

    Technical SEO
    3
    6
    3537
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • tdsnet
      tdsnet last edited by

      Hi there, I'm trying to create a 301 redirect for the file "index.php" but I keep getting a "fail to redirect" message in Firefox whenever I insert it into the Web.config file.

      <location path="index.php"></location>

      Is there anyway around this? Thanks for any help

      According to Open Site Explorer, there are about 500 links to my index file but it only has a 302 status so will not be passing link juice.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • tdsnet
        tdsnet @AlanMosley last edited by

        Hi Alan,

        Thanks for that, it worked perfectly!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • AlanMosley
          AlanMosley last edited by

          Yannick seems to have it right, but here is another way

          <system.webserver><rewrite><rules><rule name="DefaultRule" stopprocessing="true"><match url="^index.php"><action type="Redirect" url="/"  =""></action></match></rule></rules></rewrite></system.webserver>

          tdsnet 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • YannickVeys
            YannickVeys @tdsnet last edited by

            Did you add/activate all the right plugins/dll files?

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • tdsnet
              tdsnet @YannickVeys last edited by

              Thanks Yannick,

              I'm using the configuration tag and there isn't a CMS being used. The page is accessible via index.php, but I'm currently redirecting it using a PHP script (this is fine but it doesn't provide a 301 redirect).

              I'd hopefully like to replace this using the web.config file but it only results in an internal server error or an infinite loop.

              Thanks again.

              YannickVeys 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • YannickVeys
                YannickVeys last edited by

                 <configuration><location path="index.php"></location></configuration> 
                

                Did you add the configuration part?

                Is your home page available on the / part of your domain? Or is it only accessible via index.php? What CMS are you using?

                tdsnet 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • 1 / 1
                • First post
                  Last post

                Got a burning SEO question?

                Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                Start my free trial


                Browse Questions

                Explore more categories

                • Moz Tools

                  Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

                • SEO Tactics

                  Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

                • Community

                  Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

                • Digital Marketing

                  Chat about tactics outside of SEO

                • Research & Trends

                  Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

                • Support

                  Connect on product support and feature requests.

                • See all categories

                Related Questions

                • measurableROI

                  Where did the "Location" go, on Google SERP?

                  In order to emulate different locations, I've always done a Google query, then used the "Location" button under "Search Tools" at the top of the SERP to define my preferred location.  It seems to have disappeared in the past few days?  Anyone know where it went, or if it's gone forever?  Thanks!

                  Technical SEO | | measurableROI
                  0
                • AdenaSEO

                  Link rel="prev" AND canonical

                  Hi guys, When you have several tabs on your website with products, you can most likely navigate to page 2, 3, 4 etc...
                  You can add the link rel="prev" and link rel="next" tags to make sure that 1 page get's indexed / ranked by Google. am I correct? However this still means that all the pages can get indexed, right? For example a webshop makes use of the link rel="prev" and ="next" tags. In the Google results page though, all the seperate tabs pages are still visible/indexed..
                  http://www.domain.nl/watches/?tab=1
                  http://www.domain.nl/watches/?tab=24
                  http://www.domain.nl/watches/?tab=19
                  etc..... Can we prevent this, and make sure only the main page get's indexed and ranked,  by adding a canonical link on every 'tab page' to the main page --> www.domain.nl/watches/ I hope I explained it well and I'm looking forward to hearing from you. Regards, Tom

                  Technical SEO | | AdenaSEO
                  1
                • reidsteven75

                  How Does Google's "index" find the location of pages in the "page directory" to return?

                  This is my understanding of how Google's search works, and I am unsure about one thing in specific: Google continuously crawls websites and stores each page it finds (let's call it "page directory") Google's "page directory" is a cache so it isn't the "live" version of the page Google has separate storage called "the index" which contains all the keywords searched.  These keywords in "the index" point to the pages in the "page directory" that contain the same keywords. When someone searches a keyword, that keyword is accessed in the "index" and returns all relevant pages in the "page directory" These returned pages are given ranks based on the algorithm The one part I'm unsure of is how Google's "index" knows the location of relevant pages in the "page directory".  The keyword entries in the "index" point to the "page directory" somehow. I'm thinking each page has a url in the "page directory", and the entries in the "index" contain these urls.   Since Google's "page directory" is a cache, would the urls be the same as the live website (and would the keywords in the "index" point to these urls)? For example if webpage is found at wwww.website.com/page1, would the "page directory" store this page under that url in Google's cache? The reason I want to discuss this is to know the effects of changing a pages url by understanding how the search process works better.

                  Technical SEO | | reidsteven75
                  0
                • malinkymedia

                  Using the word "FREE" in domain name

                  Hi, This may seem like a simple question but a new client of mine wishes to use a domain name with the word "free" in it. The website will offer free activity vouchers. I couldn't see this being a problem as there a lot of websites that do this although he was told it may present a problem with the search engines thinking the site was spammy. It won't be and will be offering information and vouchers on local sporting activities. I was wondering if anybody could clarify this please so I can give him a more definitive answer to his question. Thanks for your help.

                  Technical SEO | | malinkymedia
                  0
                • acecream

                  Wordpress "incoming search terms" plugin

                  Hello everyone! newbie to SEO and have been trying to keep everything nice and ethical but I've seen on a couple of blogs today "incoming search terms" at the bottom of the blogs, then a bullet pointed list of search terms  beneath it. So I had a quick search about the use of it and noticed wordpress has a plugin that automatic ally generates these "incoming search terms". I ask is this a legitimate plugin or will this harm my blog? I assume it generally will as I can't see this being much use for the audience, rather it would be 100% for trying to lure in search engines.

                  Technical SEO | | acecream
                  0
                • CommercePundit

                  Does it really matter to maintain 301 redirect after de-indexing of old URLs?

                  Today, I was reading latest blog post on SEOmoz blog about. Uncrawled 301s - A Quick Fix for When Relaunches Go Too Well This is very interesting study about 301 & How it useful to maintain traffic. I'm working on eCommerce website and I have done similar stuff on my website. I have big confusion to manage 301 redirect. My website generates new URLs due to following actions. Re-write dynamic URLs. Re-launch entire website on different eCommerce platform. [osCommerce to Magento Commerce] Re-name category. Trasfer one product from one category to another category. I'm managing my 301 redirect with old practice. Excel sheet data from Google webmaster tools and set specific new URLs for redirect. Hoooo... Now, I have 8.5K redirect in htaccess... And, I'm thinking it's too much. Can we remove old 301 redirect from htaccess or not? This is big question for me. Because, all pages are not hyperlink on external website. Google have just de-indexed old URLs and indexed new URLs. So, Is it require to maintain 301 redirect after Google process?

                  Technical SEO | | CommercePundit
                  0
                • EugeneF

                  404 crawl errors from "tel:" link?

                  I am seeing thousands of 404 errors.  Each of the urls is like this: abc.com/abc123/tel:1231231234 Everything is normal about that url except the "/tel:1231231234" these urls are bad with the tel: extension, they are good without it. The only place I can find this character string is on each page we have this code which is used for Iphones and such.  What are we doing wrong? Code: Phone: <a href="[tel:1231231234](tel:7858411943)"> (123) 123-1234a>

                  Technical SEO | | EugeneF
                  0
                • mmaes

                  Which pages to "noindex"

                  I have read through the many articles regarding the use of Meta Noindex, but what I haven't been able to find is a clear explanation of when, why or what to use this on. I'm thinking that it would be appropriate to use it on: legal pages such as privacy policy and terms of use
                  search results page
                  blog archive and category pages Thanks for any insight of this.

                  Technical SEO | | mmaes
                  0

                Get started with Moz Pro!

                Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                Start my free trial
                Products
                • Moz Pro
                • Moz Local
                • Moz API
                • Moz Data
                • STAT
                • Product Updates
                Moz Solutions
                • SMB Solutions
                • Agency Solutions
                • Enterprise Solutions
                • Digital Marketers
                Free SEO Tools
                • Domain Authority Checker
                • Link Explorer
                • Keyword Explorer
                • Competitive Research
                • Brand Authority Checker
                • Local Citation Checker
                • MozBar Extension
                • MozCast
                Resources
                • Blog
                • SEO Learning Center
                • Help Hub
                • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                • How-to Guides
                • Moz Academy
                • API Docs
                About Moz
                • About
                • Team
                • Careers
                • Contact
                Why Moz
                • Case Studies
                • Testimonials
                Get Involved
                • Become an Affiliate
                • MozCon
                • Webinars
                • Practical Marketer Series
                • MozPod
                Connect with us

                Contact the Help team

                Join our newsletter
                Moz logo
                © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                • Accessibility
                • Terms of Use
                • Privacy

                Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.