Defining the extension of URLs

 
The URLs can use various extensions. By default, all URLs end with .aspx, such as: http://www.example.com/products/kentico-cms.aspx

 
You can also use custom extensions, such as .htm, .html or any custom extension. Alternatively, you can even use URLs without extensions, such as http://www.example.com/products/kentico-cms. However, in this case, you need to configure the system as described in Configuration of custom URL extensions.
 

Excluding URLs from the CMS engine

 
If you need to add your own pages to the website, you may need to exclude them from CMS engine processing. You can do that by adding the page URL (without extension) to the Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO -> Excluded URLs value (you can enter several URLs separated by a semicolon (;).
 

Forbidden URL characters

 

URLs (document aliases and URL paths) cannot contain certain special characters. By default, the following characters are forbidden:

 

\/:*?"<>|&%.'#[]+=„“ and the space character.

 

If needed, you can add additional forbidden characters by entering them (without any separator) into the Forbidden URL characters setting in Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO. Alternatively, a regular expression may be entered as the value of the Allowed URL characters setting to precisely specify which characters should be allowed in URLs.

 

Please note that the default characters listed above will always be forbidden unless you override them through the CMSForbiddenURLValues key, which can be added to the /configuration/appSettings section of your application's web.config file. For example:

 

 

Through this key, you may either allow some of the default forbidden characters or add new ones. It is recommended to keep the default characters forbidden, since they may prevent certain types of URLs from working correctly if entered into URL paths.

 

Forbidden characters are automatically replaced or removed. You can specify the character that is used to replace forbidden characters through the Forbidden characters replacement setting in Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO. By default, forbidden characters located at the beginning or end of the path are removed completely and consecutive forbidden characters are only replaced by a single character. If you wish to have each forbidden character replaced individually, you can add the following key to your web.config:

 

 

This preference may also be set specifically for the Document URL Path property of documents (and no other URLs) via the key below:

 

 

Using URL Prefixes

 
If you need to add a prefix to all URLs (e.g. for search engine optimization), you can specify it in the Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO -> Default Url Path Prefix field.

The URLs will then look like this: http://www.example.com/myprefix/products/kentico-cms.aspx

 

Automatic creation of new document aliases

 

If you check the Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO -> Remember original URLs when moving documents check-box, new document aliases will automatically be created when a new extension or URL path is set.

 
Using language prefixes for URLs

 

If you wish to add a different URL prefix for every document culture version, you can specify it in the Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO -> Use language prefix for URLs field. If you have both language prefixes and standard URL path prefixes enabled, the standard URL prefix always precedes the language prefix in the URL. Please refer to the Multilingual and international support -> Languages and URLs topic for more details.
 
URL related settings

 
The above configuration tasks can be performed in Site Manager -> Settings -> URLs and SEO. The following table contains some of these settings and provides descriptions for them:
 

 
SEO related settings can be found in the Search engine optimization chapter.