Two Questions on RedirectMatch

[jk3210]

I just nuked several thousand pages with...

RedirectMatch 410 /dir/

Will the SEs completely delete a url from their index after receiving a 410 the very first time, or will they keep checking the url?

Has anyone found 410s to be effective in removing urls from Google's supplemental index?

[jd01]

They should...

A 404 is technically a 'not found' and may result from a temporary condition, so SEs usually request the URL over time to see if the object is 'found' or will eventually drop the URL.

A 410 is a 'gone' and *requires* manual intervention to be served, therefore SEs will usually quit requesting a URL after (or shortly after) recieving a 'gone' status, because someone had to physically put it there.

Less technically, the difference is:
404=Uh, not here? Maybe we can find it later.
410=Oh, someone took it away on purpose.

Don't know about the supplemental part.

Hope this helps.

Justin

[jk3210]

Thanks Justin.

I can't find any guideline as to how long a 410 statement should be left in place. Do you just leave them there forever?

[jd01]

Leave them until you are comfortable they have been hit by the SEs. The processing used is small enough, it should not effect the site operation - if you have multiple directories, you may want to use mod_rewrite instead, because of the ability to combine matching criteria.

Justin