Problem with Error404 Pages in Google Webmaster Tools - Help

[GAViN™©]

Ok so this is really doing my head in...

Have recently been doing a lot of redirect301 in the .htaccess file on our linux hosting for our website.

And I setup this line of code into our .htaccess file as well.

redirect 301 /ACATALOG/ http://www.dutchwest.co.uk/acatalog/

Because for some reason am getting a lot of not found url's point to links where the acatalog folder is in UPPERCASE. But physically it is in fact lowercase, and the sitemap and urllist are in lowercase too.


On Google Webmaster Tools am getting a LOT - everyday in fact, more PAGE NOT FOUND ERROR 404 in the NOT FOUND section.

Have attached a screenshot to show you what i mean.

If for example one of the not found pages is

http://www.dutchwest.co.uk/ACATALOG/CD_Players.html

It says this page does not exist, but because of the redirect 301 it does direct you to the correct page.

My question is what do I do to get rid of these pages in Google Webmaster Tools as being page not found urls???

As I can only anticipate this list will increase.

1. I dont want this to affect the SEO of the site.
2. I have no idea where google is getting these links with ACATALOG from
as the acatalog folder on the website is lowercase and the sitemap files all have links where the acatalog folder is lowercase.

Am I doing something completely wrong here or what?!?

[leehack]

Great title Gavin, wil help help help a lot of people that. You can remove unwanted URLs in webmaster tools, but like you say something must be amiss to be doing that. Try redoing your sitemap, maybe using a different tool, check your htaccess file and make sure (if on V9) that in network settings, the acatalog folder name change option has not done something silly.

[GAViN™©]

LOL, yeah just a was so pi$$ed off when i wrote the post lol
it is doing my nut in.

1. Sitemap is honestly fine.
2. htaccess file is fine.
3. Not using v9 - using v7 business
Although will check the network settings and make sure they are o.k

Just remembered on the Act_primary.html and Act_BrochurePrimary.html files
i did add the meta robot tag for noarchieve.

Would this be the problem lol?

I have removed them from the template files and currently doing an upload as we speak.

[Duncan Rounding]

I tried a few pages at random on your list with lower case acatalog and they all returned 404s. Presumably you have deleted these pages anyway and this would be the expected response.

You can check your server logs to see which referrers the capitalised ACATALOG is coming from.

I think you are panicing about nothing - let the pages die gracefully.

(Please change your thread title)

[GAViN™©]

You can check your server logs to see which referrers the capitalised ACATALOG is coming from.

Where can I find this from Duncan?
Hmmm.. which pages did you try with lowercase acatalog that returned 404 pages, as I have been doing a lot of 301 redirects for these pages, maybe i missed some out accidentally. As they should redirect to the new pages.

[Duncan Rounding]

I tired many of them - the reason I got 404s seems to be because I typed for example batteries instead of Batteries.

Your server logs are usually avaibale on your server somewhere - depends on your hosting. If you can't find them then ask your host where they are. Google Analytics might also show you this information if you are using it.