WiscWeb will be using new infrastructure with the release of UW Theme 2.0. With this new infrastructure, fuzzy URL matching will no longer be enabled. Users may see a 404 error page when visiting URLs that previously redirected to published content.
Important: This change impacts URLs when parent/child relationships are used. If you update a post or page by adding a parent after it has been published, action may be required (described below).
Background
WordPress natively includes a function to redirect pages that should result in a 404 to an existing page. When someone enters a URL for a page that does not exist, WordPress attempts to land the user on a real page by guessing where they intended to go. This is referred to as “fuzzy URL matching.” It occurs when the accessed URL resembles that of an existing page on your site. Instead of a 404 error, WordPress tries to help by redirecting you to an existing webpage.
What’s coming?
In the future infrastructure, we’ve applied a filter to disable the fuzzy URL matching. This means that WordPress will no longer “guess” at which page you had been aiming for, if you inaccurately type a URL.
With this change, you may notice that links that used to work are now displaying a 404 error. This is to be expected. It’s an indication that the URL in your link is not correct and needs to be updated.
Why are we making this change?
- Fuzzy URL matching involves an expensive database search and can lead to slowdowns.
- It can harm SEO by adding links to search engines to incorrect or unintended URLs.
- A user could end up viewing a post they might not necessarily want to be viewing.
- Pages that don’t exist on your site should return a 404 page/message to let users know the content is not available. If the content has been moved or replaced, you can use the Redirection plugin to set up a redirect to another URL.
- It is the responsibility of the site owners to ensure that their content is accurate and up to date. This includes site navigation, links, and redirects.
What is required of you?
If your links break after you update the parent/child relationship, consider two possible next steps:
- Manually update any references to that link on the site and/or partner sites.
- Create a redirect in the Redirection plugin to forward the old URL to the new one.
If you often change parent/child relationships and don’t want to have to manually add redirects every time, consider updating your Redirection plugin to monitor changes and automatically apply redirects for these instances:
- Navigate to Tools > Redirection
- Select the Options link at the top
- Scroll down to the URL Monitor options
- Check the option for “Monitor changes to posts” and “Monitor changes to pages”
- Scroll down and click the Update button
Also, please consider building a custom 404 page for your site to ensure that your users are aware that the content does not exist.
Questions
If you have questions regarding this shift, please connect with the WiscWeb team via the Customer Support Form on the WiscWeb website. Our team is happy to work through any questions that you might have.