[Robbie Ferguson]

Do we hold onto www. or drop it and become http://category5.tv (instead of http://www.category5.tv)?

What are you more apt to type or use?

The issue:
By removing the www. we have to start over in the search engines. I'll setup 301 redirects so it's not a HUGE big deal, but it could be pretty painful for a few months as the search engines find the new url.

[ajamison]

I would do it the other way setup redirects on category.tv to redirect to www.category5.tv

[Robbie Ferguson]

Has done that since we started.

[ajamison]

I can see no reason to reverse it unless you really want to reset your google ranking

[Garbee]

Most browsers don't even show the http://www. anymore. No reason to reset things. Yea, it saves some clicks, but the first 301 redirect to move to www. is no big deal at all, most people won't even notice. Moving would also break older bookmarks in case anyone has those.

[Robbie Ferguson]

Yeah okay, I'll leave it.

Yes, good point Garbee; most hide it anyways.

ajamison the main advantage to removing it is SPEED: because MOST people will only type "category5.tv" and not the full "www.category5.tv" into their browser, it means they must first hit our DNS and then redirect to www.category5.tv - so it adds a bit of lag to the initial page load for them. But if you type www.category5.tv in, it will load faster.

[ajamison]

really? My host does not redirect they merely map both instaces to the same physical folder on the server so www.mysite.com would actually point to the local file /var/www/html/index.html also the exclusion of the www. would also direct to the same location. I am not sure if this is the same thing or not but i get no redirect ethier way. if someone goes to the site using the www all pages have a www. in the address if they do not have the www. in the address no pages they navigate to will

[Garbee]

ajamison, Yea you can do things that way (as my hosting provider does as well by default) but, it is also preferred that you either force either the usage of www or not using it. I think this has something to do with SEO and usability. I am actually about to make the new store site I just launched force no www since I just relaunched it and SEO sucks on that thing anyways.

[Robbie Ferguson]

ajamison, that's the default action of web hosts, yes... however as web developers it's our responsibility to setup htaccess redirection to use either or, but not both, otherwise the search engines won't know which to index, and you'll therefore lose standings in the search engines.

[ajamison]

ah that makes sense though if i am submitting to google i usually general an XML sitemap and submit it to the google crawlers. Still you make a good point did not think of it that way.