Here's something that doesn't reassure you when you go looking for your favorite airline, as I did to check on a flight just now.

Poor old Virgin. Knowing the Virgin site as I do, I think it crashed around the time Googlebot came along. I find it crashes a lot.

Still, Virgin deserves some blame.

What happens if the dynamic back-end to the site crashes? Well, it's either trying to redirect to a page it can't find or Google's trying to follow a session id link it had before but no longer works.

But shouldn't Google be smart enough to see it's getting a 404 error and not index a broken page. Yep, if it were getting a 404 error. But it's not.

Try this:
http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/index.jspdfdfdd

That page doesn't exist, so it produces a 404 error. Or so it would seem. Rex Swain reports the page is temporarily redirecting (302) to the error page that says right on it, Error 404. Sadly, it tells browsers something different, a 200 found message. So Google says great -- I tried to get the home page, you told me it moved somewhere else, then you gave me the page from its new location. That page was an error page, but since Virgin didn't actually send the header code to say it was an error, Google merrily plays along believing what it's told. And that description? Why's it seem so nice? That's the Open Directory kicking in to help solve some of the mess.

Richard, please, sort out the web site!

Next Post: Visiting Stonehenge? Eat At Reeve The Baker!
Previous Post: Tour Stonehenge The Right Way -- Private Access
All Posts: Daggle Archives
Posts By Category: Daggle Categories
Return To: Daggle Home Page

Comments

Want to comment? If you are signed into TypeKey, you'll see a form below. No form? Click on the sign-in link below, and you can sign-in or sign-up for a free account. Sorry you have to use TypeKey, but I use it to avoid comment spam. All comments currently appear automatically after posting.

Leave a comment

Name

Email Address

URL

Remember personal info?

Comments (You may use HTML tags for style)