I have a weird problem that has only started to show itself since a secondary domain name of hours started to become active, the SEF URLs are all wrong, some of them have /index.php/ inserted into the SEF URLs and other perfectly good SEF URLs just don't work at all. Some SEF URLS have random and incorrect component names inserted. Some just point to the 404 error page. Anyhow SEF URLs are dead on my site and I've had to turn Artio off.

I've done some investigation and this is what I have found.

domain1 is the main domain
domain2 has been pointed at the same space in cpanel as a parked domain

joomla 1.5.8
joomla cacheing is ON
Artio SEF v3.3.2
Virtuemart extension 2.0.2

system is stable and there have been no changes.

Now domain2 has become more active we are getting more accesses from that domain name.
Since that time if we access the site under domain1 we are seeing lots of sef URLs with the wrong domain name stored in the cache, so some SEF URLs will begin with domain2 rather than domain1.

So, we set up .htaccess to have a 301 redirect from domain2 to domain1.

It all looks good and we see all URLs showing domain1. It all seems to work until someone access the site through domain2, then the URLs start to break. Site works perfectly without Artio but as 30 mins after Artio is switched on then the site breaks.

I have tried everything, clearing caches for Joomla and Artio, each time I have to reset everything in order to get the site working again. I have even restored the site to an earlier version to see if it was some unknown change but to no avail.

The final thing I have done is to turn off Joomla cacheing altogether. Artio is switched on again and so far it seems as if the URLs are all good.

What I seem to have found is that Joomla cacheing must be switched off if you have multiple domains pointing to one site. Using a 301 redirect, Artio and Joomla seem to work together creating bad URLs.

I would really appreciate some feedback from Artio with regard to this as it seems that multiple domains is not really supported. What I have set up seems to be perfectly sensible. Perhaps it is a bug with Joomla cacheing.

Here are some examples:

1. Artio inserts index.php and a random component name in the SEF URL
www.domain1.co.uk/index.php/component/jo...fon-short-dress.html

2. Artio inserts index.php and a different random component name in the SEF URL
www.domain1.co.uk/index.php/components/c...shop/images/stories/

The following URL exists in Artio's list of SEF URLs

shop/dresses/floral-printed-chiffon-short-dress.html

pointing to:

index.php?option=com_virtuemart&category_id=6&flypage=flypage.tpl&manufacturer_id=4&page=shop.product_details&product_id=108&Itemid=74

so if I put these into the browser manually,

www.domain1.co.uk/shop/dresses/floral-pr...fon-short-dress.html
takes me nowhere but the error page

whereas:
www.domain1.co.uk/index.php?option=com_v...id=108&Itemid=74

works perfectly, this should be exactly the same,it is OK and a good URL so why doesn't the SEF version work?
It makes no sense at all. When I turn off Joomla cacheing then it all seems to resolve itself.

Yereverluvinunclebert

By the way I am using fully paid up versions of Artio and the VM extension.

Hello,

ok, that was a long one :-).
A few facts:

fact nr. 1: when there is index.php in the URL, it is NOT JoomSEF generated URL
fact nr. 2: JoomSEF supposes that only 1 domain name for site is used! (except the case, when you use JoomFish and you have different domains for different languages)
fact nr. 3: Having multiple domains pointed to 1 Joomla site without 301 to main not good for seo at all, as you have completely duplicated content; if you make 1 domain "main" and the others always redirect to that one, then you should have no problems;
fact nr. 4: if you have configuration as in 3), there should be no problem switching the "main" domain; JoomSEF relates everything relative to what is the Joomla base URL

Hopefully, I have targeted all your points.

Jan,

Thanks for the response, very quick too. My original post was a long one, sorry about that.

no.1 index.php is inserted only when Joomla cache is on and as you will see from my example the SEF URL is appended to it - so Artio SEF is creating the SEF part of the URL and not the prefix?

no.2 I understand that it must have a main domain and I can confirm I don't have joomfish.

no.3 I definitely have good working 301 redirects in place and they are all working, pointing to the main domain

The site is now working without Joomla cacheing and Artio is creating good SEF URLs. With Joomla cacheing on, and with the 301 redirects in place bad SEF URLs are being created.

It is only when those three items are configured that the problem occurs.

So to wrap it up:
Artio SEF with Joomla cacheing and only one domain is OK!
Artio SEF with Joomla cacheing with multiple 301 domain redirects breaks the URLs

Q. What else could be creating the bad SEF URLs if not Artio?
Q. Why do the bad SEF URLs only start appearing when cacheing is on?

I can show you my .htaccess, I have the redirects in place before the SEF rules. Could the rules be conflicting?

Yereverluvinunclebert

Hello,

ad the rules - it depends on how the redirects are written, but if the problem occurs only if Joomla cache is on, then I would rather guess the problem might be something like the plugin ordering. Make sure JoomSEF plugin is ordered first of all.

will try the re-ordering and will feedback the results here