Canonical redirects when it should not

[andy]

With redirect_canonical disabled, this works:
​http://celebrity-babies.com/?year=2008&cat=36894

With it enabled, it redirects here:
​http://celebrity-babies.com/category/main/breastfeeding/

This kind of query cannot be expressed as a permalink. redirect_canonical should not redirect to a permalink unless the permalink perfectly matches the query in the URL.

[filosofo]

See #5989

As I point out there, there is a way for it resolve to a permalink, one that already works in WP:

​http://celebrity-babies.com/category/main/breastfeeding/2008/

[filosofo]

I mean, when you have the right permalink structure enabled, such as

/%category%/%year%/%monthnum%/%day%/%postname%/

it works already, and it should work the same way for requests such as you mention.

[andy]

No matter what your permalink structure, currently redirect_canonical will convert some queries into the wrong permalink. It must not do this.

[akhost]

Looks like I have to CC my email, not my username, sorry.

[jeremyclarke]

filosofo: That just doesn't work for me either and I have a permalink structure like the one you named. There is no accesible way to get the date in with a category name.

Just to be clear, the goal is to show only posts from that category and that time period, not to get to a specific post as your example implies. Changing the post permalink structure seems to have no effect for me, and if I add stuff like that in the 'category base' option it just creates broken links with the replacements (%year%) still inside.

It's not a simple problem but its an important one to face, as cat+month is pretty obvious as a need.

@andy and @akhost: My solution for this was to disable redirect_canonical selectively. In my plugin code I check the query variables, and if 'm' (month) is present then I disable redirect canonical, otherwise I leave it alone. This lets the rest of the SEO benefits work without stopping the month archives from working.

// --------------------------------------------
// Filter redirect_canonical to disable it for ?m=
// --------------------------------------------
//
// End redirection any time there is a $m value in the url
// Passing FALSE to redirect_canonical filter ends redirection
// Needed for ?cat=x&m=y style urls to work. Otherwise you are 
// forwarded to category without month. 

// DISABLED: this turns off canonical redirectoin completely, which is overkill. see above.
// remove_filter('template_redirect', 'redirect_canonical'); 

function gv_redirect_canonical($redirect_url) {
	global $wp_query, $wp;
	if ((int) $_GET['m']) return FALSE;
	return $redirect_url;
} //gv_redirect_canonical()

add_filter('redirect_canonical', 'gv_redirect_canonical');

[filosofo]

Replying to jeremyclarke:

filosofo: That just doesn't work for me either and I have a permalink structure like the one you named. There is no accesible way to get the date in with a category name.

Well, it works for me with that permalink structure. :) But my point is not that it's always working correctly. Clearly it's not---that's why I have a related ticket already. My point is to respond to andy's statement that "This kind of query cannot be expressed as a permalink." I'm saying that there is a logical permalink that expresses that query, and WordPress should redirect to that permalink (which also should work all the time).

Just to be clear, the goal is to show only posts from that category and that time period, not to get to a specific post as your example implies.

I agree with that goal; I didn't mean to imply otherwise.

[akhost]

Could you please clarify-- when saying it should redirect and work all of the time, does that mean you will be adding some sort of supported permalink structure for this query in the future? Thanks!

[jeremyclarke]

@akhost: I'm talking to him in IRC right now. He means that regardless of whether you CAN make a link that works right now (without using the %category% element in your post urls, which is very bad in many ways and isn't a viable solution) it SHOULD work, so yes, he means that it needs to be worked out.

I think his main intention was to say that we should NOT depend on raw urls like ?cat=1&m=200808, but instead figure out nice permalinks that can solve the problem instead (though the ugly versions should still be converted if they are used).

Does that makes sense? Our choice solution would be to (once the redirects are worked out) also have a new function for creating pretty permalinks with multiple query vars, something like:

get_archive_url('cat=1&m=200808');

Who knows when that might be done though, so for now I recommend my workaround until it happens.

[janeforshort]

Still needs patch, punting b/c we're in beta.

[dd32]

Current status:

URL: http://localhost/wordpress/?year=2010&cat=1 redirects to http://localhost/wordpress/2010/?cat=1 which redirects to http://localhost/wordpress/category/uncategorized/

[wonderboymusic]

Current Status in trunk: ​http://wordpress-core/?year=2010&cat=1 redirects to ​http://wordpress-core/2012/?cat=1