Changing my file extensions

[melvin]

Hi everyone,

I have a site created a couple of months back and did not do any work on getting the site optimized. It's generating about 200-300 visitors a month.

I plan to start working on it now. The question is, I'll be changing the files from .htm to .html (due to the software that I'm using). As the .htm files have already been indexed, the .html will only lead to duplicate pages, hence danger of being a spammy site.

I could just delete the .htm files and start all over again.

But is there a way to change the files to .html while not losing the advantage of my .htm pages already being indexed?

Thanks.

~ melvin

[Paz]

Hmmmm.....

Don't do it.... get new software, which software are you using anyway?

>I could just delete the .htm files and start all over again.
That would take too long, I know from experience you would be getting 404 errors for months. You can leave all the old pages up, and redirect each htm page to the new html pages. If you use the same filenames you can do it automatically.

The best way to do that depends on which sort of hosting you are using eg php or asp.

Cheers,
Paz.

[melvin]

Hi Paz,

>Don't do it.... get new software, which software are you using anyway?

One of the site builder software.

>If you use the same filenames you can do it automatically.
The best way to do that depends on which sort of hosting you are using eg php or asp.

I'm using php.

Another option would be to manually change the generated pages from .html to .htm

Would that be the better way?

~ melvin

[jlknauff]

why do you care if it's .htm or .html?

[melvin]

Because I would prefer not to manually change the files to .htm but then I would lose out on the .htm visitors though it's not a lot. :-)

[dilligaf]

I think Paz nailed this one. If your pages are already indexed and you get any traffic at all from SE's changing the extensions will start this process over from square one... the theres the issue of duplicate content while the old files are still in the index.

PHP isn't software. What's the name of the program you're using to generate your pages? Most commercial software allows you control over the extensions for html.

[jlknauff]

What I'm saying is why change a file from htm to html? There is no benefit.

btw Paz - I just noticed where you're from. I was there a few years ago.

[Paz]

[QUOTE=jlknauff]
btw Paz - I just noticed where you're from. I was there a few years ago.[/QUOTE]
Hope you liked it here! We don't get many Americans... never had a chance to talk to any of them...

Melvin, thinking about it, I've had another idea. It's a new site, and not yet optimised. Why not put up your new pages, leave your old pages in place with a meta tag robots "Noindex, Nofollow", and an HTML link to your new page at the bottom of each page. (ie no automatic redirects.)

In time the old pages will disappear from the index, and in the meantime your old visitors can still find their way to the new pages.

Cheers,
Paz.

[jlknauff]

IMO he would be better off 301ing the old pages to the new ones.

[jocelyn]

He said he could rename the files... why not. Much safer and it's not like it's such a big job, unless you have tons of them or change them all the time.

If there's a lot of pages... renaming and 301 may be a pain, but when you have a bad start, it's rare that fixing it is easy, so you'll have to evaluate the less painful solution. I'd say you have 2 choices :

- Find a software that will allow to save the files as you please.
- 301 all the old pages to the new ones and be stuck with this software.

[madmonk]

or borrow yr friend's dreamweaver and use it to modify files names.
dreamweaver automatically updates filename changes for all files.