Tracking 404 errors

Instructions for Tracking 404 Errors

What the add-on does

Records requests for which CS-Cart displays a missing page and counts repeated errors for each URL and domain pair. Supports permanent 301 and temporary 302 redirects. Type 404 is a log entry, not a redirect. Errors returned by the web server before CS-Cart runs are outside this log.

Where to find the add-on

Before version 4.18.1, the “MS: 404 pages” entry is added under Website → SEO. In the newer interface, look for the corresponding action on the SEO rules page. The exact administration route is redirects.manage.

Import and export entries are under Administration → Import data and Administration → Export data. There are separate 404-page and SEO redirect formats. The add-on card has no tracking options. The package declares a conflict with ms_redirect_301; simultaneous use is not supported.

Reviewing the log

Search by source or destination URL. Sort by URL, storefront, domain, destination, type, status or hit count. The counter increases when a 404 page is displayed again; a successful redirect ends earlier and does not increase it. It is not a unique visitor count.

Configuring a redirect

1. Select the intended storefront, then open a recorded error or add a record.
2. Enter a root-relative source path such as /old-product/?color=red, without a protocol or domain. Query parameters and trailing slashes are part of the exact match. Wildcards and regular expressions are not supported.
3. Enter a working destination such as /new-product/ in the target field. Avoid self-redirects and chains that return to the source.
4. Choose 301 for a permanent move or 302 for a temporary one. Type 404 only logs errors. An unchanged log entry need not be resaved through the edit form, where the destination field is marked as required.
5. Set the status to Active and save. Redirecting requires an active record, type 301/302 and a non-empty destination.

The form supplies the domain and storefront name from the current context. Select the correct storefront before saving: editing can assign its domain to the record. Check the source domain separately from the storefront name in the list.

Bulk changes

Edit several rows in the list and save them together, or select rows for bulk deletion. Export existing data and back up the database before imports, deletion or bulk edits. Reimporting an export is not an automatic rollback of every change.

404 log import and export

Use the 404-page import/export entries and export a sample first to obtain the exact headers and file format.

• redirect_id is the required record key. Do not reuse IDs from another store without checking their mapping.
• url is the source path including query parameters; from_url is the hostname only, without protocol or path.
• company is the storefront name; to_url is the destination.
• type is 301, 302 or 404; status is A for active or D for disabled.
• counts_transfer is the error counter.

Imported domains do not pass through the edit form’s normalization: use a hostname. Change one exported row, import it and verify the record and storefront response before importing a larger file. Do not mix this format with SEO redirects.

Separate SEO redirect format

The SEO redirects section works with standard SEO redirects, not the 404 log. Required fields are src, dest and Language. Ultimate also uses Store, which is required in the general context without a selected company. Select the import language and export a sample first.

Importing an existing static rule updates its destination by source and language. Matching and duplicate cleanup are not restricted by company: identical source paths in the same language across storefronts require verification on a test copy. Do not assume complete storefront isolation for this import.

How to check the result

1. Open a new missing path on a test storefront. Confirm a type-404 entry with the correct domain and counter 1; repeat the request and check that the counter increases.
2. Configure a 302 redirect to an existing page. Use browser developer tools to check the response status and Location header, then confirm that the destination opens.
3. Check a permanent 301 separately. Browser caching may affect repeated checks; use a new source path or disable caching.
4. Compare paths with and without query parameters and trailing slashes: these are different source URLs.
5. Disable the rule and confirm that it stops redirecting. If the original page is missing, subsequent requests are counted as 404 errors again.
6. After a sample import, check the domain, type, status, destination and actual response. Repeat for each storefront in use.

If a rule does not work, compare the exact path, query parameters, domain and status first. If an error is not recorded, confirm that CS-Cart generated the response rather than a web server or cache. The add-on records actual requests; it does not crawl the catalog for every broken link.