Joven Blog

How to Rewrite a URL

The principle of URL rewriting is actually setting a "system" on the host server that will allow it (i.e. the server) to know how to interpret the new URL format. What actually happens when one decides to rewrite the URLs of a certain Web site is masking the dynamic URLs with static ones. This means that the URLs that previously contained query strings with elements such as "?", "+", "&", "$", "=", or "%" will contain the more search engine friendly "/" (slash) element and present themselves in a simplified form.
To help you with cleaning your URLs, there are rewriting tools and engines, some free of charge, other fee based.

Online / Open Source Tools

• free online URL rewriting
• open Source URL Rewriter for .NET / IIS / ASP.NET
• open Source rewrite-module tuned for ASP.NET 2.0
• mod_rewrite

This is the most common non-fee-based rewriting engine. It is a module from the Apache HTTP Server that allows the easy manipulation of URLs. The use of this module requires enabling the RewriteEngine on your Apache server. Then, rewrite rules must be defined, and you can even set conditions for each rule, thus allowing you to rewrite requests as they come in.

In terms of SEO, mod_rewrite can be helpful if you have complex URLs that contain more than 2 parameters. In other words, if one of your dynamic URLs is accessed, the mechanism behind mod_rewrite will "translate" it into a shorter, friendlier, static-looking URL.

Fee-Based Tools

• ISAPI_Rewrite
The Internet Server Application Program Interface (ISAPI) is another URL manipulation engine that functions in a similar way to Apache's mod_rewrite, with the difference that it is designed specifically for Microsoft's IIS (Internet Information Server).
• IISRewrite
IISRewrite is a stripped down implementation of Apache's mod_rewrite modules for IIS. It is a rule-based rewriting engine that allows a Webmaster to manipulate URLs on the fly in IIS.

URL Examples

Below are some examples of how URLs can look before and after rewriting:

Example 1:
• Dynamic URL: http://www.companyname.com/products/items.php?id=x&model=y&variety=z (before rewriting)
• Static URL: http://www.companyname.com/x/y/z.html (after rewriting)

Example 2:
• Dynamic URL: http://www.example.com/cgi-bin/gen.pl?id=4&view=basic (before writing)
• Static URL: http://www.example.com/4/basic.html (after writing)

Conclusions

URL rewriting can bring you on the right track in the race for SEO (combined with other techniques that you may use for this purpose). But be aware that rewritten (and, presumably, better looking and more effective in terms of search engine ranking) URLs cannot substitute a poorly designed Web site.

So don't expect miracles. Nevertheless, when you decide that your site needs a makeover and start rewriting your URLs, make sure that:
• You keep them as short as possible (to increase usability),
• You use dashes rather than underscores (to give yourself a better chance of ranking as high as possible in the SERPs),
• You user lowercase letters rather than uppercase ones (to avoid case sensitive situations), and
• The technology you have used cannot be detected in any of your URLs (to prevent possible hacker attacks).


About this author

Adriana Iordan is a Web Marketing Manager at Avangate B.V. - eCommerce platform for Electronic Software Distribution Service incorporating an easy to use and secure online payment system plus additional software marketing services and sales tools.