number only file names

4 posts by 2 authors in: Forums > CMS Builder
Last Post: December 8, 2008   (RSS)

By nigelparry.net - December 5, 2008

One of the problems I run into with CMS Builder is the defaults, some of which make questionable choices from my point of view.

How do I get rid of the silly "entire title as filename" feature and return it to a "number only filename" in the section editors? Here's the code at present:

<?php echo $record['_link'] ?>">

Add this is what URLs look like now:
http://clientdomain.com/articlesDetail.php?The-Legality-of-the-West-Bank-Wall-Israel-s-High-Court-of-Justice-v.-the-International-Court-of-Justice-4

All Interactive Tools products seem to default towards this keyword-oriented filename. I'm prepared to be wrong on this but I've never seen them make any difference to SEO, especially when they're auto-generated with every preposition (and it of) added.

Mostly, all these long URLs seem to do is break when you send them in e-mail and make it impossible to give them out over the phone.

I'm looking for something like this:

http://clientdomain.com/articlesDetail.php?1
or
http://clientdomain.com/articlesDetail.php?article1

Alright, I'm done hating on long URLs now. :-)

Thanks! :-)

Nigel
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Re: [Dave] number only file names

By nigelparry.net - December 5, 2008

Thanks Dave!

That was super easy.

When you talk about hand constructing PHP echo tags, I guess you mean by inserting echo tags in the templates/generated code and in that space manually constructing a URL out of record numbers and links? Can you give an example?

Or can you add some generic text in this same "Filename Fields" text box in the Section Editor interface?

I'm stuck in the Article Manager way of thinking where you can go into the Publishing Rules and define file names with plain text and then have a field name, eg.

article<num> <ext>

Thanks,

Nigel
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For more information about Nigel Parry and nigelparry.net
websites please see http://nigelparry.net

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Website & print design
Internet, public relations & media consulting

Re: [nigelparry.net] number only file names

By Dave - December 8, 2008

You can specify any field you want in the filename field. So you could create a new field "filenameText" and fill that out for each record to have that content appear in the url.

You can also hand craft an url like this:
viewer.php?<?php echo $record['num'] ?>

And put anything else you want in there:
viewer.php?hello-world-<?php echo $record['num'] ?>

And then with .htaccess, mod_rewrite, and other tricks you can drop the .php, and craft just about any kind of urls you want.

The best way to start would be to figure out how you'd like your urls to look and then work backwards from there.

Hope that helps!
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com