Hide file from search engines

4 posts by 2 authors in: Forums > CMS Builder
Last Post: February 1, 2012   (RSS)

By wendy - January 31, 2012

Hi - I have page that I can set the status as "visible" (shows on web site), "pending" (doesn't show on web site) and "hidden" (this is a hold over from Artman 2 and I forget what it does). If I create a page and set the status to pending or hidden, it does not appear on the web site but the page is visible to search engines. What do I need to do so a page is not available to search engines until the status is "visible?" Thanks.

Re: [wendy] Hide file from search engines

By (Deleted User) - February 1, 2012

Hi wendy,

Search engines explore every link on a website unless you specifically instruct them not to.

If there are any links on any page that lead to the hidden or pending pages then the robots will find them whether they are on your site or another.

For more specific details on how to hide pages from searches (in this case, Google) have a look at http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1663419.

It is worth spending time getting familiar with robots.txt and sitemap.xml usage as it will enable you to better manage search results and how your site is returned when searches are performed.

Hope this helps,

Tom

Re: [Tom P] Hide file from search engines

By wendy - February 1, 2012

Thanks. The issue not that there were links leading to the page because there were not. The pages were pending or hidden so no links off the index pages were created yet. It looks like a pending or hidden page gets created and put on the server even though it isn't linked and the search engines find the unlinked page.

Is there a way to prevent a pending or hidden page from being created and put on the server so it doesn't get found until it is made active?