Canonical URLs: htaccess Rewrite Rules

A web address of a website said to be a canonical URL when that is officially preferred to use to access the corresponding content.
Few know the fact, but most sites are accessible via two different address: http://www.thecustomizewindows.com and
https://thecustomizewindows.com

 

Impact of canonical URL

 

For search engines this means having duplicate content.

 

Duplicate content?

 

The duplicate content is that when a single web page with unique content is accessible via two or more different urls.

In the case of canonical URLs, engines consider that page is duplicated and therefore may choose to index one or other of the address to the detriment of the latter.

 

Risk of canonical URLs:

 

It can have serious problems with duplicate content. The penalty for such transgression of guidelines is not automatic but can be tasted that breaks the camel’s back if you collect illegal practices also known as  blackhat SEO.
Beyond the duplicate content, there is also a risk of leakage of link juice . In fact, if you have a index.php page, that is accessible from the address http://www.thecustomizewindows.com/index.php and https://thecustomizewindows.com/index.php and then other sites might links to the pages using one or the other urls. In terms of page rank, the page https://thecustomizewindows.com/index.php will get ½ PR links pointing to them instead of receiving all. Its Page Rank will be divided into 2 halves.

 

Interpretation of canonical URLs engines

 

It is generally recognized as engines, including Google, are becoming smarter and recognize this problem and canonical URL so they choose the url with “www”  or without “www” (this known as preferred domain, you can set it from Google Webmasters Tool) without taking any penalties against the particular site. That said it is better to choose to use the url you want than to leave the engines choose for us.

 

Forcing the www subdomain

 

There are also methods to correct this problem of canonical url:

 

• Just go to your Google Webmaster Tools account , then go to Tools> select the preferred domain> and you choose the domain you want. Finally, confirm your choice.
• Using a htaccess file (for Apache server)
  To force the www subdomain (and prevent the indexing of the site without this subdomain), put the following code at the top of your .htaccess at the root of the site:

 

Instead, to delete the www subdomain (and prohibit indexing site with this sub-domain), put the following code at the top of your. Htaccess at the root of the site:

 

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