#5765 – Changing a SEF url

Hi

1 -

The URL in its original form is still there - see URL 2 on screen dump.

It is not. That record is for another URL, index.php?option=com_content&Itemid=1278&catid=44&id=250&lang=en&view=article.

That is a duplicate of the original URL, index.php?option=com_content&Itemid=1094&catid=44&id=250&lang=en&view=article, the one that you modified.

2 - The reason no alias is created is exactly that: a redirect from (creative-social-marketing...use-killer-drug) cannot be created because this URL already exist and is valid.

I suspect what you want to do is customize all the duplicates for that page. When no duplicates are left, an alias will be auto-created.

Best regards

Hi

on the basis that there was little traffic to that page, we deleted URL2, but URL 1 did not show an alias.

That's expected, the alias is created at the very moment you customize the URL, there is no "surveillance service" that comes later to see if a change in conditions now allows for the alias to the be created.

Spanner is there.

The wrench only indicates that this URL has been customized. It has no connection to having an alias. There is a separate icon for aliases.

we deleted URL2

You may delete this record (or rather BOTH records as it has at least one duplicate showing on your screenshot) but it will come back probably immediately.
Those non-sef urls exist on your site, Joomla will create them next time someone displays a page on your site that includes that non-sef URL.

Best regards

Hi

If we altered the URL, would it auto-create an alias covering both URLs?

I think there's a misunderstanding here. When you customize a URL, you customize ONE URL. There cannot be any alias created because the other URL still exists.
If you want BOTH URLs to be customized in the same way, then when you customize the second URL an alias will be created automatically - because now the old URL does not exist any longer.

Say you have:

/old-page which has 2 duplicates.

index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=12
and
index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=34

You therefore have 1 record in the SEF URL manager - /old-page - showing that it has index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=12 marked as the main URL for instance and a duplicate counter of 1.

Then you customize this record to change /old-page to /new-page.

When you click Save, you now have 2 records in the SEF URL manager:

/new-page --> index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=12
and
/old-page -> index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=34

And no alias has been created to redirect /old-page to /new-page because /old-page is still a valid URL and it can be used normally.

Now if you decide you also want to customize the remaining /old-page to also become /new-page then when you do customize and press Save your are back with ONE single record:

/new-page --> index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=12 as the main and index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=34 as a duplicate.

And you should now have an alias to redirect from /old-page to /new-page.

Best regards

Hi

I assume that if the URL has no duplicates, it would create an alias?

Yes, it does.

A couple of weeks ago, we changed a couple of URLs. We couldn't work out why the alias wasn't being created, so we copied the old URL, deleted it, then added it to the new URL as an alias.

I'm not sure what the question is. An alias will be created if the target URL (the alias) does not already exist.

Best regards