More Google frustration

[Wildcat Media]

Here's the latest email:



The report says:



Redirects? WTF, Google?



I'm not even sure how to process this. On another site, I had something in robots.txt that Google didn't like, so they stopped indexing the entire site. (It was a crawl-delay directive from years ago, something they easily could have ignored, yet chose to penalize us despite them saying they ignore it.)

So here we are again. If I drill down through the individual URL, I get this:



And if I click on INSPECT for the User-declared canonical, the link shows up as being valid, as it should. And, is indexed.



Is this just something to throw more panic into us, or something down they road they will decide is unacceptable and will start removing the site from the index? I know redirects are a way of life with XF, but why point this out to us if the pages are redirecting to their intended target? The last thing I want to see is this, when I first visit the report:

 

[Mr Lucky]

It's a pain isn't it? I've just nbeen through this

All those redirects could be http > https blanket redirect. Or www to non www

If you look around GSC there are various filters to show only https and /or only submitted pages.

The 403s are probably indexed but google can't get to them due to permissions. Have a look at one of the URL examples and check whether it is hidden from guest (eg Google) but still being indexed (ie look in the sitemap) So any member only primes should be set to noindex

404s and excluded by noindex (if they are permanently gone ) should just be dropped by google sooner or later. But maybe not if there are external links to them. Redirects are useful in that case (for SEO)

 

[Mr Lucky]

So here we are again. If I drill down through the individual URL, I get this:

The canonical is not so relevant - it should be the same. But is the URL that is indexed the same as the URL shown when you load the page?

It would be useful to know the actual URL, but maybe you have a reason for reacting it.

 

[Starbucks]

these are my errors, the canonical tag is mainly caused by Bob's Showcase add-on. Not sure if I should be worried about that or not? Any way to fix that?

 

[Mr Lucky]

these are my errors, the canonical tag is mainly caused by Bob's Showcase add-on.

Which canonical tag? You only have 9 duplicate pages without a user canonical. I'd identify the duplicates and put in 301 redirects. Issues with 3rd party addons should probably best be addressed in the addon's support thread.

 

[Starbucks]

Which canonical tag? You only have 9 duplicate pages without a user canonical. I'd identify the duplicates and put in 301 redirects. Issues with 3rd party addons should probably best be addressed in the addon's support thread.

I was talking about about the first line in the first screenshot. The second screenshot is the list of that first line "alternate page".
When clicking on the duplicate ones, it shows me a list of all the index.rss links.

Sure, will reach out to @Bob about the showcase indexation.

Thanks, lucky!

 

[Mr Lucky]

I was talking about about the first line in the first screenshot.

Alternate page with proper canonical tag isn't really an issue. In fact it is good that it isn't indexed. Maybe it's just to scare you or maybe it's just for information for you to check it is what you intended.

Sadly xenForo (and various addons) does not give us any control over canonicals.

 

[Wildcat Media]

All those redirects could be http > https blanket redirect. Or www to non www

From the types of links in my screenshot, they all end up resolving to the proper URL. Honestly, I don't how how/why/where all these URLs are coming from, and how they even got out there.

So https://forums.xxxxx.com/posts/29305210/ redirects to https://forums.xxxxx.com/threads/the-xxxxxxx-thread.349350/page-6584#post-29305210 and the page is there, active, and indexed.

I'm questioning more why Google thinks this is a big enough deal to throw everyone in a panic because there's a redirect being followed. No, I never expect short URLs and redirects to be indexed. And I don't even know where Google is getting the shorter URLs--I certainly don't see where they are given out, and I doubt members even know this sort of link exists. Google's report clearly says the source is not the sitemap.

As for the 404s and 403s, those are probably due to threads we've moved to "problem" areas to get them out of public view. Those I'm not worried about.

I'm thinking this is all something I probably shouldn't worry about, but still...why all the emphasis.

I really dislike Google but on the other hand, it's a necessary evil...

 

[jgaulard]

And I don't even know where Google is getting the shorter URLs--I certainly don't see where they are given out

Check your "Latest Activity" page under "What's New." That's generally where the /posts/ URLs come from. That page and also emails that are sent to members, but Google wouldn't know about them. If you scroll down the Latest Activity page and roll over each and every URL in each post, you'll see them sprinkled about.