When we first unwrapped URL Rewriting for Siteflex a few years ago, we did it in such a way as that nothing needed to be changed in the existing Siteflex database. Today, however, we are taking the next step of URL Rewriting by implementing cleaner, extra friendly URLs.

The areas currently outside of the Siteflex administrator's control, such as the dynamic content from the News & Events and Products modules, are our initial focus - with the News module's changes now being live.

"But my URLs are already inviting me over for dinner - that's pretty friendly?!" Yes, but did they pull out the good wine or the bad wine? The new extra friendly Siteflex URLs are only pulling out the best, top shelf stuff!

What is an extra friendly URL?

• No special characters - rewritten or otherwise.
• Hyphens instead of underscores for 'spacing' replacement - as is more SEO friendly and already recommended in SEO help for Siteflex Page URL Names.
• Trimmed URL - no extra spaces.
• A single URL item entry now limited to 250 characters - which should be more than enough!
• Completely lower case.
• But most importantly: easy to read by humans.

This is our new extra friendly URL, that brings out the good stuff:

• http://www.siteflex.com.au/news/n/enhance-your-forms-instant-e-mail-response-by-including-response-details

This is our old friendly URL, a bit stingy:

• http://www.siteflex.com.au/news/n/Enhance_your_form::s_instant_e-mail_response_by_including_Response_Details

...and this poor blighter doesn't invite anyone over for dinner:

• http://www.siteflex.com.au/default.asp?page=news&news_id=40512

The best part is that Siteflex users don't have to do a thing! The extra friendly URLs are generated by Siteflex automatically. All new News & Event items will generate an extra friendly URL, and if you edit and save existing News & Event items it will also generate the new extra friendly URL - and the old, less friendly URL will still function too!

The new extra friendly URLs will be rolling out for the various modules of Siteflex over the coming months. Enjoy!