Creating_Search_Engine_Optimized_Drupal_URLS
============================================
:author: Aaron Ball
:email: nullspoon@iohq.net


== {doctitle}

A big piece to search engine optimization is how your URLs are structured. A
ways back, I was talking to a buddy of mine who does SEO for a living and he
suggested that I use WordPress' URL rewrites to make my URLs friendlier. I went
ahead and set my blog up for a 'yyyy/mm/dd/title' format and it did wonders for
my search rankings.  Recently however, I moved to Drupal which sadly does not
automagically create the friendly aliases to your posts. There is good news
though. In typical Drupal fashion, there's a module for that (kind of like
"there's an app for that") and it is very customizable.

To set yourself up with article urls (or blog urls) that autoalias with a
format that you want, you need to grab two modules. First you need the
*Pathauto* module, and that depends on the *Token* module. Before we continue,
I'm writing this to fit a Drupal 7 scenario, so likely some of the stuff will
be in a slightly different place if you're running 6 or 5.

Now, once you have those enabled, head on over to the Configuration->URL
aliases section of your Drupal site. Once there, select the pattern tab.

Where we put our aliasing string here depends on whether your writing your
content as a blog or an article content type.

If you blog in article content types, put the following string in the
*Pattern for All Article Paths* field:

----
[current-date:custom:Y]/[current-date:custom:m]/[current-date:custom:d]/[node:title]
----

If you blog in blog format, put the following string in the *Pattern for all
Blog entry paths* field:

----
[current-date:custom:Y]/[current-date:custom:m]/[current-date:custom:d]/[node:title]
----

image:files/pathauto-alias-strings0.jpg[height=300]

Keep in mind that I formatted those strings for blog entries. If you're doing
basic pages or something like those, you likely won't want the format I used in
this article. Just expand the *Replacement Patterns* section in your patterns
tab to see what other options you have for formatting those URLs.


Category:Drupal


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