Never change your Blog permalinks!
I learned that lesson the hard way.
If you have no idea what I am talking about that is great news.
Stop reading now!
Click the Back button on your browser and read something else!
(A five second pause as the Back button is clicked…)
Okay, then. 


You stayed because you, too, have betrayed your permalinks. Permalinks
as you know, is the way your blog creates a permanent URL address so
people can find you via web browsing, RSS feeds and search engines.

After posting 100 messages I decided I didn’t like my permalinks
structure and I went into WordPress (OPTIONS | PERMALINKS) and changed
them to something more appealing:

/%year%/%monthnum%/%day%/%postname%/

Well that new
structure was fine and lovely but I quite soon discovered I
subsequently destroyed all the outside links to my existing messages!

Changing the permalinks on your website immediately kills the hotlinks
others have kindly forged to your material.

You kick down a favor
when you change your permalinks structure. You can try to restore your
default permalinks structure but I was never able to recover the broken
links.

You will be lost to Google and Yahoo! Search
and MSN and all the other indexing search services if and until they
decide to Bot you again.
If you are lucky your links will be re-discovered and re-linked to your
new permalinks structure but how often do you check your old outside
links to other blogs to see if each message is still alive?

Exactly.
Dead is dead when you modify your permalinks structure.

5 Comments

  3. David Boles – New York City – David Boles was born in Nebraska and holds an MFA from the Oscar Hammerstein II Center for Theatre Studies at Columbia University in the City of New York. He is an author, dramatist, editor, publisher, and teacher who writes across the live stage, print, radio, television, film, and the web. With more than 50 books in print, David continues to write 2MM words a year and has authored over 25K articles. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Authors Guild, and PEN America, and founded The United Stage advocacy platform on the principle that playwrights have a duty to direct their own work. Read the Prairie Voice Archive at Boles.com | Buy his books at David Boles Books Writing & Publishing at BolesBooks.com | Study with Script Professor at ScriptProfessor.com | Touch American Sign Language mastery at Hardcore ASL at HardcoreASL.com | Explore the Human Meme podcast at HumanMeme.com | Train with Boles Bells at BolesBells.com.
    David W. Boles says:

    Thanks for stopping by and taking a moment to say hello, Mizchelle!

  4. There are other ways to kill permalinks too (as I’ve recently learned).. If your “categories” are part of your permalink structure, then you decide to completely revamp/rename your category…. pfffsssstttt… same results. 🙁

  5. David Boles – New York City – David Boles was born in Nebraska and holds an MFA from the Oscar Hammerstein II Center for Theatre Studies at Columbia University in the City of New York. He is an author, dramatist, editor, publisher, and teacher who writes across the live stage, print, radio, television, film, and the web. With more than 50 books in print, David continues to write 2MM words a year and has authored over 25K articles. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Authors Guild, and PEN America, and founded The United Stage advocacy platform on the principle that playwrights have a duty to direct their own work. Read the Prairie Voice Archive at Boles.com | Buy his books at David Boles Books Writing & Publishing at BolesBooks.com | Study with Script Professor at ScriptProfessor.com | Touch American Sign Language mastery at Hardcore ASL at HardcoreASL.com | Explore the Human Meme podcast at HumanMeme.com | Train with Boles Bells at BolesBells.com.
    David W. Boles says:

    Hi Paul!
    Excellent advice. Thanks for that warning. You helped us!

Comments are closed.