Question about changing HTML site to Wordpress...

[JustaWizard]

Hi Warriors!

Sooooo... if I take an existing website created in HTML with page URL's like mysite.com/page1.htm, and turn the site into a Wordpress site, the URL will be something like mysite.com/page1.php, correct?--so how do I get my Wordpress site pages URL's to be mysite.com/page1.htm instead??

THANKS!

David

[jasonvthomas]

you cant make the link look like this: mysite.com/page1.htm
unless you load it as a seperate html page.
I suggest you create a wordpress site and then take that static pages content and create a wordpress page or post and it will generate its own url based on the page name.

[JustaWizard]

Originally Posted by jasonvthomas

you cant make the link look like this: mysite.com/page1.htm
unless you load it as a seperate html page.
I suggest you create a wordpress site and then take that static pages content and create a wordpress page or post and it will generate its own url based on the page name.

Thanks Jason - the problem with that is the fact that I've got pages ranking and indexed as the URL's exist today so I'll lose that ranking even if I get them indexed quickly, isn't that true?

[jasonvthomas]

Originally Posted by JustaWizard

Thanks Jason - the problem with that is the fact that I've got pages ranking and indexed as the URL's exist today so I'll lose that ranking even if I get them indexed quickly, isn't that true?

Well host wordpress on your main domain and let those pages be there as it is, load the content of the page if you want to the wordpress page and create a redirect from your old page to the new wordpress pages.

[Leanne King]

Hi David,

First check all your links that are indexed using seo quake or similar and make a note of the links.

Then you can change your permalink structure in wp to post name.html in the permalinks. If you want to use pages you will need to install a plugin to add the html extension IntroSites Blog Archive .html Wordpress permalink on PAGES plugin

Or you could use a redirection plugin to redirect the indexed urls. There are several but this one has a lot of purposes Redirection - Manage 301 redirections without modifying Apache | Urban Giraffe

Finally, make sure that you know your site name. For example, if your old site was http://www.myoldsite.com make sure in wp that you set it up to include the "www" rather than just http://myoldsite.com. You can do this manually from your wp dashboard or you can just use the enforce preference plugin WordPress › Enforce www. Preference WordPress Plugins

All the best
Leanne

[Stefan Vee]

Step 1
Go to your wordpress dashboard
Click on Settings
Click on Permalinks
Select Custom Structure , enter

/%postname%.html

Save Changes <--

Step 2
Just like Leanne told you, download and install the ".html Wordpress permalink on Pages" plugin


Step 3
Go to pages
click on "Add New"
Write the page and publish it

Step 4
Edit the page slug according to your static site. In WP 2.7 the page slug box will appear just below your title. If you can't see that box, click on screen options in the upper right corner.
(Note: editing the page slug is only possible after you published the page - if someone knows a workaround, I appreciate the share)

[JustaWizard]

Originally Posted by Stefan Vee

Step 1
Go to your wordpress dashboard
Click on Settings
Click on Permalinks
Select Custom Structure , enter

/%postname%.html

Save Changes <--

Step 2
Just like Leanne told you, download and install the ".html Wordpress permalink on Pages" plugin


Step 3
Go to pages
click on "Add New"
Write the page and publish it

Step 4
Edit the page slug according to your static site. In WP 2.7 the page slug box will appear just below your title. If you can't see that box, click on screen options in the upper right corner.
(Note: editing the page slug is only possible after you published the page - if someone knows a workaround, I appreciate the share)

Hi Stefan, that's a slick little trick, and it looks like an easy/quick solution... I'll try it, thanks!
David

[JustaWizard]

Here's something weird, maybe you can explain... I made a post, and in the permalink I typed the name of the post and .htm and posted - the weird part is that the permalink took out the . and posted it as (I'll call it "testpost") testposthtm but if I type www.website.com/testpost.htm, it still shows up...

Anyone done this??

[Stefan Vee]

Have you tried posting without adding .htm
.htm is added automatically when you set up your permalinks the way I described

[JustaWizard]

Originally Posted by Stefan Vee

Have you tried posting without adding .htm
.htm is added automatically when you set up your permalinks the way I described

Hi Stefan! Actually, I hadn't tried that YET because the HTML site I recreated with Wordpress I had to move over to Bluehost from a hosting service not supporting PHP so I haven't been able to try that trick yet;

But - I do have a site that IS on Bluehost that I'm planning to change from HTML site to a wordpress site, and I'm DEFINITELY going to use that trick then!

THANKS!
David

[Eric Reed]

Leanne is right, you have all the control you need by setting your custom permalink structure.

Eric