Help needed with 404 and 301 error pages

Newbie question to the whys and therefores

[Storyman]

Because of the plethora of information about search engines and rankings, I thought it might be a good idea to test out some of the information to see what really gets results.

The help in this forum is extremely valuable and greatly appreciated.

One thing I noticed that troubled me were the 404 and 301 errors.

I'm hoping that someone could explain why AWSTATS is showing stats for 404 and 301 error pages. The 404 error code could be explained by people searching for pages that don't exist, but it could also mean they are looking for a vulnerability in the site. Why the 301 error codes for 'Moved Permanently'? This has been happening from day one.

Specifically, I'd like to know if this is an indication of malicious activity afoot? Is there any reason for alarm and if so what can be done about it?

I'm thinking it is probably nothing to be concerned about, but I'd thought it best to check with you guys before putting it permanently out of mind.

[IONWeb]

If you click on the 404 link in that section of AWSTATS it will take you to a detailed page showing you the page(s) or object(s) that is generating the error(s). Same thing for the 301 (which is a redirect). If you have not initiated a 301 redirect, you may want to check with your hosing company and see if it is something they have done with the server.

Hope this helps a little.

[py9jmas]

301 isn't an error message - it means "moved permanently". It's probably being caused by browsers requesting directories without the trailing slash.

If you have a directory /foo/, and I request www.example.com/foo, the server will redirect (with a 301) to www.example.com/foo/. This is important to maintain relative urls.

If www.example.com/foo contains a link to "bar", this is resolved to www.example.com/bar. But if the link is in the page www.example.com/foo/, it's resolved as www.example.com/foo/bar.

HTH

Jon.