I seem to have similar errors when Google tries to access my site. Most if not all of the errors are generated by the forum. Googlebot basically says that the links are unreachable, too long or are invalid. The links look like this:

http://www.mysite.com/Community/Forum/tabid/80/%5C/%5C/www. mysite.com%5C/Community%5C/Forum%5C/tabid%5C/80%5C/forumid%5C/2%5C/scope%5C/threads%5C/%5C/%5C/www.mysite.com%5C/RGCommunity%5C/Forum%5C/tabid%5C/80%5C/forumid%5C/4%5C/scope%5C/threads%5C/%5C/%5C/www.mysite.com%5C/RGCommunity%5C/Forum%5C/tabid%5C/80%5C/forumid%5C/3%5C/scope%5C/threads%5C/Default.aspx

Which I think is c concatenation of several links.

I have tried to follow the advice in the threat to solve the problem. Here is what I have done:

1.  Created a App_Browser folder in the root of DNN installation on the server.

2. Made two files: Googlebot.browser and yahooslurp.browser. They are as follows:

Googlebot.browser

<!--

Mozilla/5.0 (compatible;+Googlebot/2.1;++http://www.google.com/bot.html)

-->

<browsers>

<browser id="Googlebot" parentID="Mozilla">

<identification>

<userAgent match="Googlebot" />

</identification>

<capabilities>

<capability name="browser" value="Googlebot" />

<capability name="Version" value="2.1" />

<capability name="MajorVersion" value="2" />

<capability name="MinorVersionString" value="" />

<capability name="MinorVersion" value=".1" />

<capability name="activexcontrols" value="true" />

<capability name="backgroundsounds" value="true" />

<capability name="cookies" value="true" />

<capability name="css1" value="true" />

<capability name="css2" value="true" />

<capability name="ecmascriptversion" value="1.2" />

<capability name="frames" value="true" />

<capability name="javaapplets" value="true" />

<capability name="javascript" value="true" />

<capability name="jscriptversion" value="5.0" />

<capability name="supportsCallback" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsFileUpload" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsMultilineTextBoxDisplay" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsMaintainScrollPositionOnPostback" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsVCard" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsXmlHttp" value="true" />

<capability name="tables" value="true" />

<capability name="vbscript" value="true" />

<capability name="w3cdomversion" value="1.0" />

<capability name="xml" value="true" />

<capability name="tagwriter" value="System.Web.UI.HtmlTextWriter" />

</capabilities>

</browser>

</browsers>

yahooslurp.browser

<!--

Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Yahoo! Slurp; http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/slurp)

-->

<browsers>

<browser id="Slurp" parentID="Mozilla">

<identification>

<userAgent match="Slurp" />

</identification>

<capabilities>

<capability name="browser" value="Yahoo!Slurp" />

<capability name="Version" value="4.0" />

<capability name="MajorVersion" value="4" />

<capability name="MinorVersionString" value="" />

<capability name="MinorVersion" value=".0" />

<capability name="activexcontrols" value="true" />

<capability name="backgroundsounds" value="true" />

<capability name="cookies" value="true" />

<capability name="css1" value="true" />

<capability name="css2" value="true" />

<capability name="ecmascriptversion" value="1.2" />

<capability name="frames" value="true" />

<capability name="javaapplets" value="true" />

<capability name="javascript" value="true" />

<capability name="jscriptversion" value="5.0" />

<capability name="supportsCallback" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsFileUpload" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsMultilineTextBoxDisplay" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsMaintainScrollPositionOnPostback" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsVCard" value="true" />

<capability name="supportsXmlHttp" value="true" />

<capability name="tables" value="true" />

<capability name="vbscript" value="true" />

<capability name="w3cdomversion" value="1.0" />

<capability name="xml" value="true" />

<capability name="tagwriter" value="System.Web.UI.HtmlTextWriter" />

</capabilities>

</browser>

</browsers>

3. I also attempted to modify the web.config as recommended. However the mod was already there. I am using DNN 4.4.1 and Forum 03.20.08 . In any case, this is what it was in it

<authentication mode="Forms">

      <forms name=".DOTNETNUKE" protection="All" timeout="60" cookieless="UseCookies" />

 </authentication>

4. So I didn’t need to change anything. But only putting the browser files, didn’t do anything. greenmarines suggested that the web.config file should be “touched”. I thought he means that it should be modified (to change time stamp) even if it is not necessary to change content. So I did this, and, my site went down completely. I wasn’t very pleased, but if it gets to work I don’t really care. So I contacted my host to reset the server. I also thought that since the server is getting reset, this should update everything and .broswer files should be read.

5. Then I waited until Google bot came back. This time, the number of errors are different (reduced from 380 to 150). But the errors are still there

So after this long post, I like to know how to make sure the .browser files are actually doing anything. Once someone puts the .browser file, what should he or she do to get it activated?

I consider this as a critical issue, since Google or many other bots will be alarmed if a website generates a large number of errors and may have a large negative effect on SEO.

Please advice.