Making phpbb 2.0.2 search engine friendly

[X Q mano]

Hi,

I have a community using phpbb 2.0.2... Is it possible (and hopefully quite simple) to make it search engine friendly?

Do I have to upgrade the forum software, or can I use it as it is?

The address is www.xqpoetry.com/forums if you need to look at it...

[s2kinteg916]

you want to loook at phpbbhacks.com there is a hack to get rid of sessions

[sitepointRefugee]

you want to loook at phpbbhacks.com there is a hack to get rid of sessions

Session id string gets appended when cookie is disabled, which search engines don't like. If I understand correctly, the hack to make phpBB search engines friendly does

1. Identify search engine bots
2. If and when search engine bots come visit a phpBB based forum, it lets them crawl the forum while it does not create any session.

By doing these, you can let search engines crawl the forum while URL strings will be formed in the way that search engines prefer. This is actually cloaking in literal sense, but it is also an accepted practice.

[incka]

I'll use this on my forum, seems a good idea...

[sitepointRefugee]

I'll use this on my forum, seems a good idea...
If you don't mind spending a couple of hundred dollars(and a little time), you can switch to vB and if I remember correctly, you can just set a flag to make vB3 search engine friendly.

[incka]

I don't see the point. Visitors have commented the the PHPBB smileys are better and the VB ones so...

[MarkB]

Using a BB software simply because the smilies are better seems a bit extreme ;) vBulletin buries phpBB as far as admincp and general functionality is concerned.

[Mike]

Originally posted by MarkB
Using a BB software simply because the smilies are better seems a bit extreme ;) vBulletin buries phpBB as far as admincp and general functionality is concerned.

I was thinking that... :)

[incka]

I'll use VB when I make a games site has it as loads of cool competition things...

[sitepointRefugee]

I just applied this mod able2Know Search Engine Optimization 1.0.2 (http://www.able2know.com/forums/about15132.html) to my forum http://forum.ooen.net/.

The mod is available at http://www.able2know.com/forums/about15132.html. As I check threads in http://www.phpbb.com/phpBB/, whenever Search Engine Optimization question is asked, this mod is referenced. Also apparently the mod is created by one of phpBB developers, so I guess we can call this an official phpBB SEO mod. I'll see what this does to my site; hopefully, I'll get more traffic, registered members, and more activities in the forum; the forum is too quiet right now ...