Another useful thing that you can do is call a special CGI routine at time error occurs. How do you do this? Instead of modifying .htaccess file to reference an HTML document, make it reference a CGI routine directly (perhaps with error code as a parameter). This routine can send an email to you (and perhaps even page you) when an error occurs. This allows you to quickly handle any errors on your web site.

Don't get too stressed out about 404 errors. Remember that no matter how well you keep up your site they will occur occasionally. Even if every single link inside your site is perfect, other people will type or code incorrect URLs, thus causing errors. Some search engines have bugs and reference pages incorrectly and sometimes web server itself returns bogus errors. The best script that I have found to perform this function is Error Robot, available at http://www.newmediaone.com/scripts/

Personally, I prefer using a CGI routine to send an email whenever a 404 error occurs instead of asking visitor to send an email. This removes burden for quality assurance from visitors and places it upon me, where it belongs.

What can you do to prevent or correct 404 errors?

- Check links within your site on a regular basis. Correct any references that are broken.

- If an external link, say from an article, is incorrect, you can create a redirect page to move visitor from incorrect reference to correct reference. This is generally a lot easier than attempting to get author to correct reference.

- Check each and every 404 error that occurs and take steps to correct them.

Additional Resources

http://www.internet-tips.net/Surfing/404errors.htm The Dreaded 404 error This article tells you meaning of dreaded 404 error

http://www.internet-tips.net/Webmaster/htaccess_errors.htm Htaccess file - Custom error pages You can use htaccess to define custom error pages to trap 404 and other error conditions.

http://www.internet-tips.net/Webmaster/maintlinkrot.htm Check your links regularly to prevent link rot Check your links regularly to prevent link rot.

For a real trial by fire, take Vincent's tour of things that suck. These are sucky pages that Flanders put together himself, which include "pretentious front pages," "too many wrong things," going overboard with special effects, free backgrounds that suck, and bad text: http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/begin.htm

He also has a great article on "Mystery Meat Navigation" -that is, links and design that leave a user's brain addled and unable to complete a credit-card transaction. According to Flanders, recent research indicates that ""39 percent of test shoppers failed in their buying attempts because sites were too difficult to navigate." We all know that you don't want that to happen, yes? So at very least, read this excellent and funny piece on how not to confuse daylights out of your visitors: http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/badnavigation.html

Flanders is also author of "Web Pages that Suck," which you can probably find at your friendly local independent bookstore. Though it's a good, classic text about how web sites go wrong, you'll want to visit his pages as well, because according to Vincent Flanders (and he's man) humans with access to computers are discovering new ways 3:01 PM 3/29/01to suck even as we speak-so read up, and don't be one of them!