I’ve always found the forum search feature to be hit and miss and prefer using google/duckduck to type an exact search phrase.
After the forum update, most google result links point to the new forum but actually exist on the old forum. Is there any way for the new forum to redirect? Currently we only get an “Oops! That page doesn’t exist or is private.” message.
I also saw it. Maybe search engines and bots need time for scanning and recognizing wrong URLs. And with time this should be repair 
or just prepend the URL with archived. This is not an easy solution for a Manjaro newbie. I can imagine many users being frustrated with the missing pages.
But not all URLs are wrong, some fit for both, for example: https://forum.manjaro.org/c/newbies/12 and https://archived.forum.manjaro.org/c/newbies/12 – only difference is archived. That may be confused.
The issue is with Google cache. Normally it takes 6 months to catch up. We will see if we can get the process expedited.
I’m not a professional server guy, but when a missing URL is detected on the server, wouldn’t it be wiser to first check if it exists on the archived version before serving the 404 page?
It’s not only google that will have the problem. I use duckduckgo, but bing, yahoo… will all have the same cached results.
First url doesn’t actually work, it redirects to Stable Updates - Manjaro Linux Forum . Apparently the Newbie section is removed.
Better example is this search phrase:
Linux != Windows | Why should Linux want me?
Then you get this page:
https://forum.manjaro.org/t/linux-windows-why-should-linux-want-me/126641 (Oops!)
Instead of:
https://archived.forum.manjaro.org/t/linux-windows-why-should-linux-want-me/126641
How does google any other search engine a a website owner knows the address is changed, automatised software runs the internet to update search links, small websites do it manually, anyway is out of anyone control how search engines update their databases it just takes time…
I think there are ways to tell search engines to update, at least I know this exists for Google
I would imagine serving a 301 redirect on old links would give the search engine bots the info they require.
3 links sure, not 10.000 or more.
That is not how search engines work. Once an SE sees a redirect, it will look for the sitemap.xml or robots.txt. From there it will schedule a recrawl.
This can be done manually, but each SE has their own method. Google for example:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6065812?hl=en
Waiting for SEs to update their cache is NOT a solution. The problem is on manjaro’s server.
Yes re crawl can be done and is in a todo list and it still takes time as in months, but that is not what you said, you said 301 redirects.
So am going to ask everyone again to be patience, we have a list of todos that need to be done, and families to attend and day jobs, the forum is being flooded and everyone is requesting everything, it will get done when there is time.
Hi, @codesardine
An idea:
when we click on a old forum’s link in Google, we get a 404 page:
.
Perhaps, you could integrate the warning with something like:
If you have reached this page by clicking on a link related to the old forum, try the following link:
And then replicate the page address (copy it from the browser address bar) and postponing the word ‘archived’ to the address.
The user will click on the new link that will take him to the corresponding page of the old forum.
I’m not able to know the html language, but I think it would be a simple javascript, getting the address from the browser bar and adding ‘archived’ is not complicated and could be done in a short time, since it should only be written once, for the single "404 page ".
What do you think about it?
Hello,
I’ve just installed Manjaro three days ago and I’m having the classic first steps problems, so I’m googling a lot of questions, and most of them are solved in this forum.
Problem is whenever I open a link it says The page doesn’t exit or it’s private, and that happens with absolutely all of the posts I try to go into.
F.i.: https://forum.manjaro.org/t/desktop-environment-gnome-draining-my-laptop-battery/32841
Hello and welcome,
If you are using search engines to find things on the forum, and you get that error, attach archived. to the domain name.
Example:
https://forum.manjaro.org/t/desktop-environment-gnome-draining-my-laptop-battery/32841
will be
https://archived.forum.manjaro.org/t/desktop-environment-gnome-draining-my-laptop-battery/32841
I am seeing this page after clicking every page from google. It looks pretty strange.