Essential code for root landing page?

[sforum]

I have installed XenForo in a folder called xf in the root of my domain, just to maintain flexibility in case I want to use the domain for something else in the future.

At the moment, when you go to www.mydomain.com, I have the following simple index.php:

<?php
/* Redirect browser */
header("Location: http://www.mydomain.com/xf");
/* Make sure that code below does not get executed when we redirect. */
exit;
?>

So, as you can see, when you go to www.mydomain.com you are immediately redirected to www.mydomain.com/xf and everything works just fine.

However, I'm guessing that this is pretty terrible from an SEO point of view; is that right? Should I have anything else in there? What about all the usual "DOCTYPE" and "meta" shenanigans that you normally see at the top of an HTML page; should I have some of that in there? If so, what?

TL;DR = Would anyone be kind enough to show a n00b like me exactly what code would be in an ideal index.php in order to redirect to the installation sub-folder, including any important "behind the scenes" gubbins?

Thanks

 

[Paul B]

I just have this in mine.

<?php
header('Location: http://cliptheapex.com/community/pages/home', true, 301);

The 301 denotes a permanent redirect.

 

[sforum]

I just have this in mine.

<?php
header('Location: http://cliptheapex.com/community/pages/home', true, 301);

The 301 denotes a permanent redirect.

Ah right! In that case, perhaps I'm worrying over nothing. I thought it might mess with Google in some way if I was missing some key meta tags or something, but I've just Googled "clip the apex" and I can see that your site appears fine, all nicely defined and categorised, etc. so clearly redirects such as the one above are just fine.

What do the "true" and "301" variables do? I'm assuming the latter is the same as an htaccess 301 redirect (i.e. it indicates a permanent redirect), but what about "true"? Should I be adding them to my string?

Thanks.


Edit: Ah, you answered the 301 question as I was replying Is there any benefit to having it there?

 

[Paul B]

Here's the PHP manual entry which covers the header function http://php.net/manual/en/function.header.php

The optional replace parameter indicates whether the header should replace a previous similar header, or add a second header of the same type. By default it will replace, but if you pass in FALSE as the second argument you can force multiple headers of the same type.