Feb
20
2008
| Open Question: SEO Changes in Joomla 1.6 |
|
| Wednesday, 20 February 2008 | |
|
So, together with some of Joomla's brightest SEO minds, we've taken up the challenge and are writing a paper with our suggestions for improving SEO in 1.6.
We'd love to hear ideas from the community to include in the proposal:
What SEO improvements would you like to see in Joomla 1.6?
Already on the list are ideas such as improving control over metadata. What else should we do to make Joomla the most search-engine friendly CMS available?
Comments (14)
  written by Amy Stephen, February 20, 2008
Excellent! I really appreciate this approach - it's great to see the developers inviting comment and Steve, it is appreciated that you are gathering the expertise in this area. Thank you!
 written by Steve Burge, February 20, 2008
Hi Tom
Thanks for the idea. Have you tried Joomlatwork.com's SEF Patch? It does allow that in 1.5 and it would be great if we could get that code into the core for 1.6. Thanks Amy 
 written by Mack, February 20, 2008
1. Ability to do custom 404 pages as a content item. This way when links don't hit, they still get our site and we can direct them to go where needed.
2. Ability to manage the core SEF URL's and create custom redirects. 2. A simple sitemap module/plugin based on the menus. 3. Tom has a great idea. If it was built in it would be nice. written by dc006, February 20, 2008
I'd like to see option to control Meta Data, Site Name and Keywords with JoomblaFish.
In other wards make it Multi language friendly. written by Coos Creations, February 20, 2008
I appreciate that the joy of Joomla! is how flexible it is, but I wonder if other readers here would see any value in pre-configured installations?
Along the lines of JoomlaShack's school / college installation, but for other groups and industries. Working groups could put their heads together to create the ideal installation for, say a health clinic, or a children's charity or a rock group! From a sales perspective, it would be great to be able to demonstrate a pre-built site tailored to whoever you were selling it to in advance!  To echo Mack, I'd also like to see a site map and maybe even a help page out-of-the-box - just to cover the basics, like how to use the search function, how to contact the administrator, how to add the site to your favourites etc. Whaddda ya reckon? 
written by Steve Burge, February 21, 2008
From bestofjoomla.com:
First I want to say that J1.5 is much better than J1.0.X but there aren`t extensions for it, that worked on J1.0.X.  written by Good Web Practices, February 22, 2008
What a great question Steve!
We thought the answer justified a proper answer: http://www.go...com/joomla/joomla-1.6-seo.html Please take time to read our suggestions and let us know what you think. Thanks, David  written by Zorro, February 23, 2008
I'm backing David with everything he says in the excellent article on his site, with a slight twist in priorities.
If I can find the time in the next few days, I might put a few of those ideas up on my blog and collect thoughts from the German community, and post them back here. Kind regards, Zorro written by marks, February 23, 2008
Definitely would be good to have better control over meta data. Once all the white papers are in, does the community get to vote on how which ones go to the top of the wishlist? (sort of like the 1.5 template competition but without conning everyone and cheating the winner)
Tom Thorns, does the Ninjoomla plugin work for what you need http://www.ninjoomla.com/index...&Itemid=44? written by Matthieu, February 25, 2008
Good initiative folks !
SEF and SEO questions are for some people a very important question. So important that it may be the first parameter to choose a cms. But, it seems there is as many different way to do SEF url than people who want it. And it is not the purpose of Joomla to address all of the needs of all users. In my opinion, Joomla should do the basis, and the third parties plugins should to the specifics. So, the question would be : for SEF & SEO, what is the basis ? This is my answer to this question : It should be as close a possible as Google see things. And I think that regarding the url, Google love the brave old system of static html page in a directory structure. So I propose that the SEF question should be linked to the sub-categories question, as a sub-categories system, reflected in the url without numbers in it, would be a pretty basic, but efficient SEF system. It won't address all the needs, but it should be enough for the majority. So we would just have to organise our content into a categories-subcategories system, which would be usable in all component, and it reflect in the url, just as if we have put some html page in a directory structure. It's simple, understandable by everyone, and before all : this is what google love, in my opinion. Anyway better than the menu name in the url, which is a very weird way of seeing SEF url if you want my opinion. Sorry for my bad english, and hope it's good enough to understand my opinion ! written by Torkil, March 02, 2008
A bit weird with people wanting better SEF urls. I feel that 1.5 gives me the right tools for the job already. Recently read up on the use of router.php and added this to a component of mine... Dead easy! Read more here:
http://www.goodwebpractices.co...-seo.html Allows me to have urls like torkilssite.com/mycomponent/myview/ etc. Neato! Another thing that has impressed me alot is the authentication plugin system. It is being improved even more as we speak, as far as I can tell from the nightlies. Write comment
|
Joomla recently announced that 
Show/Hide comments
Show/Hide comment form
What I'd really like to see is an option on each menu link to have it nofollowed. This would allow you to take insignificant pages, such as the terms and conditions, out of the SERPs easily and so make better use of your available link juice.
I'm currently working on a mod_mainmenu hack to allow this in J1.0 using an entry such as 'nofollow=1' in the parameters field in the database.
Tom.