Welcome to the Joomla SEO Club and Book

Joomla 1.5 has really taken hold in recent months, overtaking 1.0 to become the more popular system. The aim of this post is to compare the URLs in 1.0 and 1.5 so that you know what to expect in the new version.

Some Background

Joomla has always shipped with two different URL possibilites, the "Default" setting and the "Search Engine Friendly" setting. In Joomla 1.0 the phrase "Search Engine Friendly URLs" probably wasn't accurate. Google and Yahoo never found much to love about them. It would be fairer to just call them "Shorter URLs". Joomla 1.5 offers the promise of better URLs. Lets see if thats true:

Joomla's Default URLs

These are the URLs you get when you first install Joomla. I've highlighted the small differences between 1.0 and 1.5:

• 1.0: index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5&Itemid=6
• 1.5: index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5&Itemid=6

• 1.0: index.php?option=com_weblinks&Itemid=6
• 1.5: index.php?option=com_weblinks&view=categories&Itemid=6

Joomla's Search Engine Friendly URLs

You'll have to actively make changes if you want these URLs. If you go to Site >> Global Configuration, you'll see that the SEO panel now has more options. Lets compare 1.0 and 1.5:

Joomla 1.0

Using these settings: content/view/5/6/

Joomla 1.5

Using these settings: index.php/joomla-license/3-newsflash/41-newsflash If you set "Use Apache mod_rewrite" to "Yes": joomla-license/3-newsflash/41-newsflash If you set "Add suffix to URL" to "Yes": joomla-license/3-newsflash/41-newsflash.html

You'll see that these URLs are much better than 1.0 because they contain relevant keywords from the article's name. For a detailed rundown of why keywords matter, click here. However, they also contain numbers.

• Why use numbers? To avoid the problem of having more than one article with the same name. If you have two articles called "Newsflash", how will Joomla know which is correct?
• Where do the numbers come from? Its the ID number of the category or article. You can find this in the right-hand column of the Category Manager and Article Manage.

Conclusion

• The changes in 1.5 mean you won't be able to upgrade and keep the same URLs.
• The URLs in 1.5 are an improvement over 1.0.
• You don't need to install an extra component.
• You can get these URLs on almost any webserver, so long as you don't mind the index.php in the URLs.

Find Out More

• Joomla 1.0 Default URLs
• Joomla 1.0 SEF URLs
• SEO comparison of Joomla 1.0 and 1.5
• Why keywords in URLs matter
• SEF URL coding in 1.0 and 1.5

Comments (6)

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written by Kesepian Loneliest, June 29, 2008

I actually did not knew that I can use these settings for 1.5 without installing an extra component. I fact, I was waiting for an extra component to appear! LOL.

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written by Stephen Moseley, July 01, 2008

Steve, I found the same thing when I started working on our "new site" which is not new anymore because its been sitting gathering dust.

The urls are pretty good. Still no-where near the ability of an sh404SEF, but a basic site you might be able to get by with just the core (if you don't have too many components).

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written by devon, July 03, 2008

In 1.5 you don't need any SEF component, I activate all three in the confid sef and I can get any address or keyword insertion i want based on, section, category and title alias of article.

Easy to use, easy to do!

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written by Steve Burge, July 03, 2008

Hi Devon

Thats true, but the default SEF URLs to have some problems:
http://www.serr.biz/news-blog/...pment.html
http://www.compassdesigns.net/...blems.html

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written by Zsolt Boda, July 17, 2008

Guys,
how do you make j1.5 output the meta description on the home page if the HP is an uncategorized article (w/o SEF plugin)?
On other pages fine.
TIA
z

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written by Ansiklopedi, July 17, 2008

@devon: i'm using J1.5 more than one web site. i agree with the "Easy to use, easy to do!" part for default joomla 1.5 urls but i believe the urls which are created SMARTSEF will be better

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