Changing URL's within domain

how will Google handle this?

[jimshu79]

Example:
[widget.com...]
to
[widget.com...]

First issue:
Since the URL with the underscores are indexed, if someone clicks on it, it takes the user to the homepage...is this bad?

Second issue:
How long before google drops the old URL's and replaces them with the new ones?

Any chance of problem occuring here? I basically just deleted the old htm files off the sever, and replaced them with the new ones (with the hyphens), then made changes to where my links point to from my index and sitemap.

[kwngian]

I would thought de-linking the first URL and changing it to the second would be a better option. Because ultimately the search engines will stop indexing the first URL and have only results for the second.

Just a thought ..

[jimshu79]

Yeah, basically that's what I did...ok i guess i have to sit and wait...thanks.

[mars9820]

Hi,

I had the same situation as you. I deleted the files and made permanent redirects in my configuration files.

Google picked it up in just a couple days. :)

[jimshu79]

Cool...only thing is my hosting company isn't the best, I dont even have access to my logs, so i'll have trouble doing what you did. I'll wait and add more content in the meantime ;)

[jimh009]

The other thing to do is to keep the old page up with a big "This page has moved" message on it with a link pointing to the new page. Also, in the header, put a "noindex, follow" line in for the robots.

While a pain to set up, it works great for both your visitors and your bots. The old page soon falls out of the Google index, while still having it around in the short term allows people to still get the info they want easily.