Moving Serendipity to the root...

[rj]

I know we went through this before but I have just learned from some Google people that its very important to PAGE RANK to have the blog in the root directory. They are telling me I can never gain a 6 from a directory. Only the root.

So I am now going to HAVE to get rid of the 301 and do this.
I can see two options.

Do a new install of Serendipity into the root and create a second DB. Then copy the important files from the old serendipity directories to their places in the new setup directories. Will that work? I doubt it hey.

Or remove the 301 and move the damn thing into the root and then by hand go through things to change all internal links... Including the DB?
Any advice on that?

One problem is traffic is building and its doing so well I don't want it going down now...

Thanx

RJ

[rj]

Received another Forum reply telling me ROOT ROOT ROOT!

I looked around the DB and can only find one file that contains paths that I can see... serendipity_config.

Are there any more areas in the DB that will need internal links changed?

And what about all the serendipity files themselves?
Where do I change the paths for the articles, authors, categories, archives and so on?

Sorry about this, but I have to get at it...

Thanx

RJ

[azel]

rj, check out the FAQ on moving your installation here (it's got pics!): http://www.s9y.org/198.html

Please let me know if there is anything else I can do to help!

[rj]

Thanx for the quick reply!

Cool, thats pretty much how I figured it!
Though I am not changing names but moving from a directory to the root.
Same process?
I have downloaded the serendipity directory to the HD, and assume all I have to do is upload its contents to the root?

In the config DB if its the root what is the serendipityHTTPPath 'character'?
Nothing?
"/"
or what...

And this says nothing about the serendipity files themselves.
Do I understand nothing needs to be done in say index.tpl and such?
Changing the DB changes everything else?
What about external links linking to articles?
What should I do?

Thanx

RJ

[azel]

Right, the HTTPPath should be set to "/".

As for your internally linked articles, you could export a copy of your DB & replace the path of the linked articles. For example, when I first installed s9y, I was on the /blog directory, so what I did was used Notepad's Replace function (replaced /blog with /) on the DB backup and imported that new file as my DB. And you can set it to Replace All instead of searching one by one.

Make sure to keep a spare untouched backup just in case.

[rj]

I have come a long way since I began last year. I switched from FP to Dream, learned SSI, JS and FLASH on my own, Garvin forced me to learn CSS, Judebert forced to learn enough about PHP so I can go into the serendipity files and do things and now you have forced me into the DB.

But I have a conceptual problem I need help with before I begin this project.
My directory now for the blog is /serendipity
which I want to put in the root /


First off, when I look at the serendipity code I see lots and lots of these:
serendipity_something or other
I presume that is not PATH but just naming? Just chance that my directory is the same name. Right?

Secondly, am I to understand that there are no PATHS in the serendipity files themselves. That all paths are in the DB?

I understand the replace easy enough.

One silly question too!
Concerns the "/"
When I see someone with a tshirt that says I GOT ROOT would a tshirt with just a / mean the same thing?

Thanx

RJ

[azel]

Oh yes, "the serendipity_" is just a prefix name for your database tables, in case you are sharing a database with another installation (say Gallery for instance). That way there are no two tables with the same name to confuse the two installations in your database. In won't conflict with your directory, because while the directory holds all the files to make your s9y installation run, your database stores the information run by s9y. I dunno if that makes sense, I'm kinda wordy sometimes. ^_^

And the paths are run by the database. When you move your installation to the root, the only thing in your database backup you will need to "fix" are links to other entries. And you may also want to fix any image URLs that are linked to your old directory. When you move to the root, in other words, s9y will still try to fetch your thumbnails and such from the old media directory.

I hope I explained that halfway decent. I'm running on only a few hours' sleep!

And lol, I wish I had a shirt with either of those on it. If a gal like me wore that shirt, it might mean I'm trolling for /. Just kiddin! I'm being facetious now..

[rj]

Thanx. I think you managed to have me figure out!


.
From using various dig sites to promote my blog, I recently enjoyed a month of 50,000 page views a week from Stumble. Its going down fast now though.

It was all two articles, and like most diggers, they never went from the article to the main page, the article is the landing and exit page. I still get a few hundred a day going to those two articles. External links with serendipity/.

How best do deal with that?
I plan on leaving the serendipity folder intact.
Do you think a .htaccess 301 with a /serendipity to / would do it?

I can't figure out how to add a FILE to the 301 code line in .htaccess.
Is it made to only work with directories or am I just missing something on how to do it from file to file?

Thanx again


RJ

[azel]

Aha, see there, you're thinking smarter than I am!

I believe you can accomplish using a line like this in your .htaccess:

Code: Select all

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.domain.com/$1 [R=301,L,NC]