URLSpellCheck FAQ
Does URLSpellCheck fix domain names?
No. The product fixes anything after the domain name. If you want to address domain typos, you must own each of the individual domains in question and map your DNS to fix this problem. Notice, for example, that Amazon owns both amazon.com as well as amazom.com, given character proximity on the keyboard. This may not be reasonable for all but the largest sites.back to top
Does URLSpellCheck impact server performance or hurt my page request times by doing a fix up?
Not at all. In fact, if correct URLs are used, the software doesn't even get invoked and requests pass by transparently. Only when a 404 occurs is an interception and fix attempt made. In this case, even if a performance penalty happened, it would be better than a failure page. However, since the product is implemented as an ISAPI filter, its load impact is negligible even in high breakage conditions. The software has also been stressed tested with hundreds of simultaneous connections to insure robustness.back to top
Will URLSpellCheck have any impact on my search engine rankings?
No, your SEO efforts will be unaffected by URLSpellCheck. This tool only comes into play when there is a URL errors, and search engine bots will follow the links on your site. In the worst case scenario, a multimatch will occur, and the search engine will index all of the multiple files related to the initial misspelled request.back to top
What else should I do besides fix URL spellings?
Quite a bit. First, you should make sure that your domain name is easy to type and spell. Next, make sure that you map as many machine names as possible in DNS. This means that not only should www.yourdomain.com be valid but so should yourdomain.com, wwww.yourdomain.com, ww.yourdomain.com, and maybe even w.yourdomain.com or even web.yourdomain.com. Guessing isn't bad and many users guess URLs and domains. And everybody mistypes things over time. Finally, if you do fail, provide a reasonable error page using a product like CustomError.back to top
Does your product work on Apache?
No. All Port80 Software products work only on IIS. This is a conscious effort on our part to bring competitive technology to IIS owners. However, a similar technology called mod_speling is available for Apache users. It does not provide all the features that URLSpellCheck does. If anyone is interested in a commercial port of URLSpellCheck to Apache, please contact us to discuss it.back to top
