Merged Kunena and SEO: Why would I need ANY third-party SEF plugin?

There is a huge number of discussions in these forums about third-party SEF products (like sh404SEF). From what I've seen they cause more problems than they're worth.

Why would I need to use sh404SEF? I don't want to seem disrespectful to lda, but why would I need SEO using Joomla core ?

It seems to me that there's a lot of "folklore" and hype about the need for adding further complexity to Joomla by installing these products. Are they necessary? Do they really live up to their promises?

I use the built-in Joomla Search Engine Optimization (SEO) facilities and I don't have any problems converting those "ugly" URLS into "user-friendly" ones. For example, see my test site at www.enduring.com.au/40P_demo/forum

Simple, really!

I haven't been able to find any answers or convincing arguments for the huge interest in these 3rd-party products and home-grown hacks. Could someone please tell me why that's the case. :S

Thank you. All contributions, in support of (or against) SEF tools, appreciated.

Just wrote a long post that my browser chewed.

Basically, ditch the 3rd party sef. I was needing it in the old versions of J! pre 1.5 but now you can do without it.

Thank you, eezz. This is exactly what I suspected: if you're using Joomla 1.5.x you don't need any SEF stuff at all!

What really surprises is that sh404SEF is listed at JED as a "J! 1.5 native" extension. Why bother, if J 1.5 already has the functionality inbuilt? :S :blink: :side:

Dear sozzled,

Just continuing this healthy discussion

I use the built-in Joomla Search Engine Optimization (SEO) facilities and I don't have any problems converting those "ugly" URLS into "user-friendly" ones. For example, see my test site at www.enduring.com.au/40P_demo/forum

The following link is from your test site:

www.enduring.com.au/40P_demo/forum?func=view&catid=9&id=160#162

I call it very UGLY URL because it doesnt make any sense to me, my users or search engines.

Now just install the sh404sef and check yourself the same url.

Before making any comment or starting any argument ONE MUST check, verify the argument from both sides. Have you ever use sh404sef on your site? I have been using sh404sef latest beta version on my 1.5 site since last 2 years and i do not have had any major issues related to it.
Morever sh404sef is open source product developed and managed by Shimusha alone.

And we must promote encourage open source products. If you have had any error for Sh404sef then please contact to the developer on his forum. And i am sure he will rectify it.

NEVER CRITICIZE ANY COMPONENT WITHOUT TESTING IT FULLY (I have seen your couple of posts where you mentioned about another open source component COMMUNITY BUILDER to remove it if it giving you ERROR). DO NOT PASS YOUR PERSONAL COMMENT AS GENERALIZED COMMENT.

Ending this discussion in positive note. No personal attacks or grudges.

Thanks for your reply, sunny.

I suppose, depending on your viewpoint, if you're threading your way through deeply-nested forum messages then you have to deal with long URLs. Depending on your viewpoint, these URL might appear a little unfriendly. By the same token, if you've got a message in a discussion forum, URLs in discussion forums necessarily get messy because of the way they're structured. We're already well acquainted with the long, "ugly" URLs from web-based news sites.

In the Kunena context, for example, if you'd like to get the URL of message #17168 in this website ( www.kunena.com ) - a website that doesn't use SEF tools - is it really that worrysome that the URL is www.kunena.com/forum?func=view&catid=83&id=17168 ?

I suppose, you could argue, instead of referring to message #17168 we could refer to as ... well, what could we refer to it as? The first message in the discussion topic called message Why would I need ANY third-party SEF plugin? ? You could argue, I suppose, if a tool translated the URL into something like (if it worked) would be equally as "ugly".

sunnyjey wrote:

Now just install the sh404sef and check yourself the same url.

Sorry, I don't want to do that. I'm asking people to provide a convincing argument for products like sh404SEF instead of the "suck-it-and-see" argument.

Would you agree that "ugliness" or human-readable meaningfulness have little purpose in the context of web-based discussion forum URLs? Maybe not.

A lot of the other points in sunnyjey's response assume that I personally have a problem or an axe to grind about sh404SEF. I don't have any problems at all with sh404SEF.

sunnyjey wrote:

NEVER CRITICIZE ANY COMPONENT WITHOUT TESTING IT FULLY (I have seen your couple of posts where you mentioned about another open source component COMMUNITY BUILDER to remove it if it giving you ERROR). DO NOT PASS YOUR PERSONAL COMMENT AS GENERALIZED COMMENT.

I was not criticising sh404SEF and I'm disappointed if people think that I was. I was simply asking the question: why would I need it? I haven't yet seen any information that helps me understand the matter any better.

I have not recommended that people must or should remove Community Builder. I have always insisted that people have a choice: they can choose to live with problems and errors caused by incompatible versions of Kunena and Community Builder (or whatever other Joomla products they've installed) or they can remove the source of the problems. If people are prepared to live with problems, that's their choice. If people want to bullet-proof their website, that's their choice too. Every choice you make comes with a cost.

In like manner, sunneyjey, I think this discussion can be healthy and helpful and I, too, have no personal grudges in here.

Thanks again for the feedback.

I use SH404SEF on my site but have it skip Kunena. I used SH404sef on my site when it was j1.0- now that I ported to 1.5, I don't want to drop it because I've gotten a large page ranking and don't want to take a hit in the search engines. Plus I'm lazy to put in all the redirects...

Oh yeah, I think the standard SEF for Joomla is great, but in some scenarios I want to have a custom URL- whereas the standard Joomla SEF won't allow me to do that. But I think to myself... do I want to sacrifice the ease of the core Joomla SEF for a handful of custom URL's?

Thinking too much makes me lazy also. So I'm just gonna keep SH404sef since getting rid of it will hurt my head.

They've got a pretty cool security layer to protect your site from wannabe hackers and script kiddies though. It even reports to Project Honeypot.

Overall I'd say that a 3rd party SEF component makes sense. The default Joomla SEF is quick and easy, but it's just that for now.

I do realize with the more sites I make, the more slim they become (less dependant on 3rd parties)- probably because subconsciencely I've realized that maintenance over multiple sites means work.. and well, I've already mentioned that problem that I have with laziness.

rodvold wrote:

Plus I'm lazy to put in all the redirects...

rodvold wrote:

Thinking too much makes me lazy also.

rodvold wrote:

I've already mentioned that problem that I have with laziness.

WHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Dear sozzled,

Please download sh404sef and test sh404sef at your test server to know more about this wonderful component. This is one of the component which comes under the list of Editor's Pick on JED (recommended by Joomla developers)

It provides many useful features other than nice SEO friendly URLs, like insertion of custom tags in URL, anti-flooding and anti-hacking features.

Coming to your ugly URL:
Sh404sef will transform the kunena post with heading 'Why would I need ANY third-party SEF plugin??' to exactly www.kunena.com/forum/Why-would-I need-ANY-third-party-SEF-plugin??

Even it will provide choice to insert post id for eg

www.kunena.com/forum/Why would I need ANY third-party SEF plugin??
www.kunena.com/forum/ 17168-Why-would-I need-ANY-third-party-SEF-plugin??

And not like

www.kunena.com/forum/Why%20would%20I%20need%20ANY%20third- party%20SEF%20plugin%3F

Coming to CB:

I have not recommended that people must or should remove Community Builder. I have always insisted that people have a choice: they can choose to live with problems and errors caused by incompatible versions of Kunena and Community Builder

Sozzled you mentioned 'Remove it' in reference to cb in your two posts on kunena. You failed to clarify or give explanation for that. But these words sounds as a cautionary words (though it is your personal opinion) particularly to newbies. There is always possibility that New members may take these words seriously and avert to use this wonderful open source component.

So be careful to make any statement on open forum.

I highly respect open source community and their developers like Beat, Nant, Shimusha, franstein, grumblemarc, Matias and many more who are selflessly devoting their valuable time to develop these components for us. It takes months and years to develop component and we must encourage, help them.

Try Sh404sef at your test site. I am sure that you wouldnt hesitate to have sh404sef on your production site.

Check: www.google.com/search?q=Why+would+I+need...ird-party+SEF+plugin

Back in the dark days of J!1.0.x I NEEDED a sef component. Once I upgraded I was suspicious of the performance hit and found that the number of queries was greatly reduced when using the J! cach and removing the 3rd party sef.

I was a big fan of sh404sef, and I still think it is a good solution. Primarily for the metadata and security functions it also includes. I only removed it once I had found alternatives to the http:BL and keyword/title rewriting features that I had come to rely on.

If you are running J!1.5.10 then there are many options including the router.php files that have been submitted on this forum that do basically the same as any SEF component without the DB performance hit.

Since I had been using sh404sef for so long I was concerned about the slight change of urls, but with some additions to my htaccess anything that was 404 was easily redirected.

Thank you everyone. We're really starting to get a much better understanding now.

eezz wrote:

Check: www.google.com/search?q=Why+would+I+need...ird-party+SEF+plugin

So, the fact is, websites that don't use any third-party SEF plugins, like www.kunena.com , don't suffer any penalty in the "search engine" stakes. You can still use Google to extract information from Kunena message forums irrespective of whether these website employ SEO features. Therefore, this nullifies rodvold's point

I don't want to drop [sh404SEF] because I've gotten a large page ranking and don't want to take a hit in the search engines.

These matters notwithstanding, I appreciate that there are other good reasons for using products like sh404SEF but I'm unconvinced that the primary function - turning convoluted URLs into more search-engine friendly ones - is the main reason anymore.

@sunnyjey: I'm not going to respond to your off-topic remarks about my views on Community Builder. If you had read the dozens of messages I've written about CB (not just the two you have singled out, but didn't quote) you would find that I have consistently been a strong supporter of the Community Builder product. You would do well to heed your own advice.

Returning to the discussion topic again :laugh: eezz wrote:

If you are running J!1.5.10 then there are many options including the router.php files that have been submitted on this forum that do basically the same as any SEF component without the DB performance hit.

Are you saying that without the techniques employed in router.php, the standard Joomla SEO functions can result in degraded system performance for Kunena users?

By way of analogy, it's like saying "Everyone needs Vitamin D to prevend disease. Buy 'sozzled™-brand', Vitamin D tablets." Yes, we all need Vitamin D but you can get all you need with half-an-hour's sunlight every day. Why should I buy pills (even "open source" ones) when I can get all I need without additional cost or "management overhead"? :S

Let me summarise my position for clarity: I want to know (and I'm sure there are many other users who would like to know, too) what benefits there are for Kunena by having add-on SEF components.

I want to know this information because, among other reasons, I want to know why the first question the moderators often ask is "Are you using SEF tools?" If SEF tools play such a major role causing problems for Kunena why is that the case and why hasn't something been done to eliminate them as a source? If everyone seems to believe certain SEF tools, like sh404SEF, are the greatest thing since sliced bread, am I missing out? :laugh: