PHP Links That Appear In Search Engines

[Matt B]

Hi there,

 

I am designing a PHP MYSQL web site and I want all pages to appear in search engines.

 

I have seen a web site listed in a search engine with a link like:

 

www.website.co.uk/product.php/4478/

 

If the number is changed to 4477 then a different product is loaded. How does this work? I thought the link needed a question mark (?) in the link to pass the information and I thought this was bad news in terms of SearchEngineOptimisation?

 

I am aware that if the link passed 4478 in the URL along with a question mark (?) in the URL it would load that product also but IT WOULD NOT APPEAR IN SEARCH ENGINES. Is this a common way around the search engine issue and how does it work???

 

Are there other, perhaps better ways to design my links and also the Search Engine prospects for the web site I am creating?

 

Thanks,

 

Matt.

[Matt B]

FURTHERMORE...

 

see http://www.jiffymix.com/product.php/12/Corn_Muffin_Mix as an example.

 

How do they do it? Product.php is the template? 12 is the reference for MySQL? The rest of the link Corn_Muffin_Mix is just keywords since if you delete it (or just delete some of the last letters) the link still works.

 

Any ideas?

[jggretton]

Most people do this using .htaccess and mod_rewrite.

 

You can find some basic information on .htaccess files here, and more information on mod_rewrite here (see 'beautiful urls' section).

[Matt B]

OK - Another thing about this PHP URL issue...

 

Do you know the process by which the pages are crawled by Search Engines? Do Search Engines create a hypothetical person who clicks all links of the web site and then publish all created pages to the Search Engine. Or do I have to do something myself to ensure all the pages are crawled by Search Engines, since how can Search Engines search a template page?

 

Matt.