Hi Sean,

May I know how you accessing the page with /easyblog/blogtitle at the first place? is it you manually type it in the url? where sh404sef detected that the url doesn't exist and it will stored in the 404 request log.

Hi Muhammad

I have no idea how people are accessing the URL /easyblog/blogtitle. It is not accessible from our website front end but the point is that sh404sef is picking it up from somewhere, as are some browsers to our site, for it to show up as a 404 page.

The URL clearly doesn't exist but large numbers of people appear to accessing the /easyblog/blogtitle URL. I have noticed this also in Google Analytics Real Time view, wondering where this URL comes from.

Hey Sean,

The only reason that SH404 logged them is because:

1. Someone tried to manually type in the url with easyblog

or

2. Somewhere some place, that url is somehow being generated.

or

3. It was an older setup (where the menu item was "easyblog" and some how, some search engine cached it)

I would suspect that it is #3 because I did check your site's menu and there's a trashed menu called "easyblog", http://take.ms/Ah1oe . Perhaps people are accessing it via cached contents.

I have deleted that item from the trash, but could you try to monitor to see if there are any new requests coming in with /easyblog/ in the URL for the next couple of days?

Hi Mark

Thanks for your input. I think I may have located the issue thanks to your suggestions above and I think it was related to point 2. I have JSitemap and it is using Easyblog and my main menu as site sources to generate the sitemaps (see attachment). I have sent JSitemap a support ticket so you may close this one. Thanks again.

Hey Sean,

Ah, great! Thanks for letting us know about this. At least the mystery is now resolved

Hi - sorry, thought this was fixed but it's not.

Going back to your three suggestions above:

1. Someone tried to manually type in the url with easyblog - I have now purged all the 404 records so we can start again recording the 404 errors after you found and deleted the 'Easyblog' menu that was in the 'trashed' folder. Previous to this there were over a 100 URLs with 'easyblog' in the title - I doubt very much if this has been manually typed in this many times.

2. Somewhere some place, that url is somehow being generated - despite purging as above, I checked today and these URLs are still being generated (see screenshot attached) so yes, they are being generated. But how?

3. It was an older setup (where the menu item was "easyblog" and some how, some search engine cached it) - as above, these URLs are being generated with several in the last 24 hours. So it's not a cache issue as I also deleted the Joomla cache.

I sent a support ticket to JSitemap but they have come back to say the sitemaps are set up correctly. So it has to be an Easyblog configuration issue.

Any help on this much appreciated.

Hi Sean,

Most likely this issue is caused by the #2, why? As I tried to search (google search) some of the post in your site, it seems it will shows the wrong/old links https://www.screencast.com/t/UiqWrUYn30 .

And when user try to access it , it will shows error where the link was broken/not exist (this now logged the 404 error record in sh404sef)
It seems google has cached the page: http://take.ms/Mz0eh (as per your screenshot: http://take.ms/h9lUT )
I would strongly suggest you to ask google to re-crawl and re-index your urls by following these (Fetch as Google tool or submit a sitemap) : https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6065812?hl=en

Hi Muhammad

But as I explained, this URL is still being generated. Asking Google to recrawl will make no difference, we have to prevent all URLs with the word 'easyblog' in them to stop being generated.

Please explain how I can configure Easyblog so that the URLs ONLY generate the correct URL:

blog/some-interesting-dog-owning-statistics-check-these-out

And not:

easyblog/some-interesting-dog-owning-statistics-check-these-out

Hi Sean,

May I know do you purge the SEF URLs in sef404sef as well? May I have a permission to purge the sef urls and 404 request log as well?

Your cooperation is much appreciated

Hi Muhammad

Yes, it was the sh404sef URLs I was referring to when I said I purged them. They were purged yesterday and have since generated URLs with 'Easyblog' in the title. If you feel you need to purge them again and the 404 request log, please do so but I suspect unless the underlying problem is found, they will simply regenerate.

Hi Sean,

Thanks for your cooperation, I've purged the sh404sef urls and regenerate the new sef url, and I've access your easyblog pages and it was generate correctly with links /blog/pagetitle http://take.ms/1Sv7q and by right all easyblog url in this page was generate with a correct link.

For the 404 request log, actually this section we cannot control as the user accessing wrong url, it will stored in the 404 log, as example I've access this page by manually type in the url http://take.ms/83CEJ http://take.ms/kI0wz

https://www.cannyco.com/easyblog/improve-your-canine-communication-skills-with-these-top-tips

Analogically, when user search one of your blog post with wrong url (where google has cache the old url -before you've configure the menu and link correctly) it will always store it in the 404 request log (as you see it previously there is a few wrong url that have been accessed by user but actually it is not come from your site links)

So, now you need to make tell google to re-crawl/re-index your site as it is already cache the wrong url previously.
Where I've mention previous reply some post was cache(links) by google about a month ago http://take.ms/Mz0eh (as per your screenshot: http://take.ms/h9lUT )

By following these (Fetch as Google tool or submit a sitemap) : https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6065812?hl=en
By then,your user can search and accessing the correct link when they click on your link in the google search. In result, in the 404 request log there is no wrong links stored.

Hi Muhammad

OK, thanks for your help. Now I think I understand.

I will resubmit the sitemap to Google and see what happens.

Sure Sean keep us update