Using special extension (not .html,.php,.asp etc)

[rfontaine]

I have created a new website and am thinking of using a non-standard extension for my pages. For example,

www.example.com/this-article.xyz

It is a php driven site and I will have the server parse .xyz files as php.

As far as you know, would there be any problems with this, including things like SEO etc?

[henry0]

What is the reason governing your quest?
Is it a new SEO test?

[ergophobe]

I'm curious too. Normally, if I'm going to the trouble of determining extensions, I opt for no extension at all.

[rfontaine]

I have created an in-house content management system -

When having no extension on a file name, wouldn't many systems consider it to be a folder containing the default file:

for example:
www.example.com/the-article-number-8

is really considered to be:
www.example.com/the-article-number-8/index.php

Whereas my method makes it appear closer to www:
www.example.com/the-article-number-8.xyz

That said, do you think some search engines may "choke" on having an unusual extension?

[coopster]

When having no extension on a file name, wouldn't many systems consider it to be a folder containing the default file

No, actually the difference between folder (directory) and file is the slash (/).

http://www.example.com/folder/ 
http://www.example.com/file

[rfontaine]

Thank you.
But what about the extension part? Does it matter whether it is .abc, .php, .whatever as far as search engines go?

[ergophobe]

No search engine will choke on an extension, but there are good reasons to avoid them. In the now-classic and still wise article by Tim Berners-Lee, Cool URIs Don't Change [w3.org], he has a section entitled, "What to leave out" where he says

File name extension. This is a very common one. "cgi", even ".html" is something which will change. You may not be using HTML for that page in 20 years time, but you might want today's links to it to still be valid. The canonical way of making links to the W3C site doesn't use the extension.

I haven't always followed that advice, but when I haven't, it's been laziness, not intention that led me into temptation!

[rfontaine]

ergophobe, This is excellent. Thank you very much for your help!

[bouncybunny]

On the other hand, if you ever need to mod_rewrite a whole site of files.xyz extensions to files.abc, it is much easier if those extensions existed as opposed to just files.

[ergophobe]

Actually, I agree. I always have extensions on my files, but avoid them on URLs. I try as much as possible to think of file names as data and URLs as interface. The only need to have a mechanism to map them to each other on a one to one relationship. They don't need to be the same.

[wmuser]

As far as you have the server parse .xyz files as php it should affect users browsers to process the file as a php file but i am not sure if search engines will like unknown fle extension
Its a good idea to use .html