Managing redirects

Redirects allow one URL to be redirected to another. Redirects should be set up when a URL changes so that visitors to the original URL will still find the page they are looking for. Only users with the site manager role have access to create, edit, and delete redirects. 

When content is renamed or moved the URL of the page and the URL of any children pages below it will also change. For children pages, their URLs will not change until they are edited and resaved. If the URL of a parent item is changed, you should resave any items affected by the menu change or renaming. 

Adding a redirect 

Note: When redirecting changed paths, redirects should be set up from the old path to the new path. 

1. From the administration bar, select Workbench, and then select My Dashboard. 

2. Under the Site management menu, select Redirects. 

3. Select + Add redirect. 

4. Enter the path that you want to redirect from into the Path field. Only include the part of the URL that will follow the URL for the site’s home page (e.g. if you were wanting to redirect “https://uwaterloo.ca/example-site/old-url”, you would only enter “old-url”). 

5. Enter the path that you want to redirect to into the To field. If redirecting within your site, use the autocomplete to find your page (the autocomplete will use the node of the page, that way if the URL changes in the future your redirect will still work), or enter the internal path (e.g. “/new-url”).  If redirecting to another site, enter the new URL. 

6. Select 301 Moved Permanently as the Redirect status, unless you intend to remove this redirect shortly and restore the original URL, in which case you should select 307 Temporary Redirect. (The other options have very limited use cases and you should only use them if you are absolutely sure they are correct.) 

7. Leave the Language as All languages. 

8. Select Save. 

Editing a redirect 

Redirects should be updated if they have errors, or the destination has moved to a new location, to avoid creating “chains” of redirects. 

1. From the administration bar, select Workbench, and then select My Dashboard.   

2. Under the Site management menu, select Redirects. 

3. Find the redirect you want to remove (using the filters if necessary) and select Edit from within the Operations links. 

4. On the edit page, make any necessary changes, then select Save. 

Removing a redirect 

Redirects should be removed when they are no longer needed, or the destination no longer exists. 

1. From the administration bar, select Workbench, and then select My Dashboard.   

2. Under the Site management menu, select Redirects. 

3. Find the redirect you want to remove (using the filters if necessary) and select Delete from within the Operations links. 

4. On the confirmation page, after checking that you are removing the correct redirect, select Delete. 

Note: When referencing internal pages on your site, it is best to use autocomplete instead of a manually typed relative path. The autocomplete will reference the node of the page, which is useful because if the referenced page is renamed or moved the linked content will still find the page without the help of a redirect.