It would be an HTTP redirect, I think, written out by ASP VBS code, like:
<%
dim serverName
serverName = request.ServerVariables("SERVER_NAME")
if inStr(1,serverName,"domain1.com",1)>0 then
response.Redirect("/directory1")
end if
%>
... or in ColdFusion processed prior to display, like:
<CFIF FindNoCase("domain1.com","#CGI.SERVER_NAME#") GT 0>
<CFLOCATION URL="/directory1">
</CFIF>
Most robots would follow that?
Thanks for the info.
--mark--
=hedges=
-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Daviel [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Saturday, December 08, 2001 10:03 PM
To: Mark Hedges
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [Robots] robots follow redirect scripts?
On Sat, 8 Dec 2001, Mark Hedges wrote:
>
> I checked in the FAQ and other sites but found no information about
> whether most robots will follow a redirection to another page. We
> only give shared hosting customers 1 IP address and they use redirect
> scripts to direct their viewers into subdirectories for different
> domains. I am trying to find out if most robots will follow the
> redirect script into the subdirectory. Thanks for any info you have
> to share.
I think that most robots will follow an HTTP status 301 or 302
redirect; however I suspect that what you are referring to is
an HTML META refresh directive or javascript function.
I believe that my (somewhat defunct) robot would follow a META link; it
would certainly follow the usual "if that didn't work, click here"
link, adding one hop from the root document in the process (whereas
an HTTP redirect would not incur a hop) - since it is not a global robot,
it is restricted to N hops from an origin. It would ignore any javascript.
I have read that certain robots will refuse to index a page
that has a META refresh redirect, since it is in effect presenting
one set of content to the robot and another to a human (whose browser
jumps immediately to the next page). I am not sure if this
would also affect the harvesting of links. In theory it should not, but in
practice it may.
--
Andrew Daviel, TRIUMF, Canada
Tel. +1 (604) 222-7376
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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