404 Error Tracing?

[simplyjond]

Hi,

 

can any of you experienced webmasters (i.e. longer than a week) help me, please?

 

My site is up and running and as far as I can tell it seems to be operating correctly. There are no missing pages; there are no blanks where graphics should appear; I can navigate successfully to all pages; etc.....

 

Nevertheless, my error log is filling up with 404 error messages. Mainly saying the same thing:-

 

[Mon Sep 1 09:13:16 2003] [error] [client 161.114.64.75] File does not exist: /home/simplyj/public_html/404.shtml

 

This ain't exactly helpful as it doesn't tell me what page or image or link or anything else is causing the error to be logged . I've looked in AWStats in the error section, but that is not giving any useful info either .

 

How can I track down and eliminate these pesky barsteward errors ? Any help/advice would be greatly appreciated Thumbs Up .

 

thanks,

 

simpljond

[TCH-Sales]

Well from what you have shown us, that looks like your 404.shtml file is missing. Here's what I do to take a look at all my horrible little 404 and error messages though:

 

1. Go into AWStats

2. Go down to the very bottom of the main page where it says: HTTP Error codes

3. Click on the "404" (it should be a blue link)

4. Then that should give you the path of the page that's missing, the number of times somebody has hit it, and where the link was referred from.

[simplyjond]

Hi,

 

thanks for that and I've tried what you said.

 

There is no 404 in the AWStats display (blue or not).

 

You're right I don't have a 404.shtml file - don't know what it is, why I need it, what it would look like, and what it would contain?

 

I see I've had search engine crawlers on the site today - could that have any connection with the 404 errors? They also appear to have been looking for a robots.txt file that I don't have either? Should I have one; what is it; what does it look like/contain, etc???

 

It is dreadful being this ignorant - I hate it Mad!!! Mad!!! Mad!!!

 

thanks for your help,

 

simplyjond

[TCH-Dick]

a 404 page is the error page a visitor to your site will see if they try and go to a page that doesnt exist. My 404 page is very basic but you can customize it a LOT heres an example of mine.

 

http://www.x-trememodz.com/fhwfh.htm

[simplyjond]

Hi Mike,

 

thanks for that example.

 

I suppose it's too naive to say I'd like to eliminate the errors as well as have some way of dealing with them?

 

But so far I can't even track down the cause - I know it's not caused by customers visiting the site, because there haven't been any yet!! And, as I said, I haven't experienced any errors when testing the site.

 

thanks,

 

simplyjond

[TCH-Don]

There is a great thread on 404 error pages

where many family members contributed a lot of info

in CPanel and Site Maintenance

[simplyjond]

Hi Turtle,

 

yep, thanks for that. I've followed thru the links and created a 404error page and edited the .htaccess file etc.

 

But since I don't know what was causing the errors, and I wasn't experiencing any problems myself when visiting the site - I don't know if it's having any effect .

 

But I guess I'll just wait and see if the error log stops piling up with messages - that might be some sort of indication!!

 

if only I could eliminate the varmints.

 

thanks all,

 

simplyjond

[TCH-Don]

If is the robots.txt file that is missing

you can just create a blank one for now,

to eliminate that error,

and add to it when you need to.

 

there is a tutorial at

www.searchengineworld.com/robots/robots_tutorial.htm

 

or

www.robotstxt.org/wc/faq.html

 

and for a Robots.txt syntax checker try

www.sxw.org.uk/computing/robots/check.html

[simplyjond]

Hi All,

 

after yesterday's overnight run updated AWStats, I went in and found the section on errors and there was a 404 listed, blue colored and it was a link. So far so good .

 

So naturally, I thought this was it - I'll find out where it's living and exterminate that pesky 404 rat once and for all . And low and behold, the link tells me that the problem is being caused by......... NEOMAIL!!!!

 

/neo-images/neomail-bg.gif # error hits=78

 

Gosh, darn-it!!! All that sweat and tears checking out everything I could lay my hands on that I'd written. All that tearing my hair out. Ho hum,. Great life this web site creation, think I'll go back to playing Monopoly - at least I could pretend that I understood the rules of that game.

 

My error log today is telling me that I've got a "404.shtml" file missing. I never refer to that file anywhere on my site. Also I put a one liner into the .htaccess file in the public_html folder and pointed all 404 errors at a specially created page called "404error.html" - so any ideas why I need a "404.shtml" file or where this error is coming from, please?

 

thanks,

 

simplyjond

[TCH-Don]

Your error file must be named

404.shtml

 

I did not add anything to the .htaccess file,

I just uploaded the 404.shtml file to the root folder and it works.

[TCH-Dick]

you can also go to your cpanel and in the section labeled custom error pages modify your 404 page and it will save it as a .shtml

[simplyjond]

Mike,

 

had a look at the custom 404 in cPanel and couldn't understand it at all - so rapidly got out of there.

 

I tried putting a blank file called 404.shtml into the root folder, but it didn't stop the error log entries because apparently such a file was required in the public_html folder. So now I've created a blank file called 404.shtml into the public_html folder, as well.

 

The reason I've created blanks, is because I don't know what should go in to such a file. Does anyone have a sample of a 404.shtml file that I could look at please?

 

many thanks

 

simplyjond

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