Redirecting error pages

[Brian Turner]

I'm not really one for customising error pages - CPanel offers you a list of error pages to customise, but the problem is that if you update your site template, you have to go back and redo your error page customisations.

Wouldn't it be so much easier if you simply redirected error traffic to somewhere more useful - you know, like your site index page, where you can direct people to you most useful pages?

Oh - alright then - place the following in your .htaccess file on an Apache server:

ErrorDocument 400 http://www.platinax.co.uk/

Of course, do remember to change the domain name it describes to your own...

[aberbotimue]

ARH yes..

I am the lead designer on a new open source CMS.. I was thinking, one could add that facility, realy quickly, to use the current template, but all it is is another normal page, just alter the web server to point at the correct one.. that way , you can have dynamic error pages, as the referer.url of the error redirect, is still the original url, so you can do your best in code to figure out, what they did wanty, or maybe do a search if you have one on your site..

I'm babling now, arn't I... I think its time for bed!

[Brian Turner]

No, it's actually a good idea - I've worked with people before who used software applications to take the keywords out of referrel strings and deliver ads and a unique URL based on those keywords, to create a useful user experience.

Now, if a CMS were able t deliver dynamic error pages providing further links based on keywords of the referrer keywords/link then that could be a very useful feature - perhaps it could serve results on a keyword basis, very much like from a search engine. Now *that* would be useful.

Error pages in general seem easily overlooked, and most default 404's are useless for everyone - there's little point in being told there is a page missing if there's no further useful information on how to find whatever it was that you were specifcally looking for.