Many Internet users often face such a problem as "404 not found". This error appears if the requested page of the site (address) has been deleted, moved or never existed. The 404 error has several reasons that are not difficult to understand.
The “404 not found” error message is a standard server response, meaning that there is no information (file or page) at the user's request. In other words, this response indicates that the requested page is currently unavailable.
Causes of Error 404
The "404 not found" error occurs for many reasons. The most common among them are the following:
- Incorrect entry of the page address
- Changing the page address (moving the page to another address)
- Failure of the site or server
Additional reasons
This problem often occurs for other reasons. So, a 404 error may appear when there is no connection (or unstable connection) of the device to the Internet. Therefore, the required page does not load. Also, a 404 error message may appear when the antivirus blocks the page.
Solution to the problem
The work on the 404 error depends on the cause of the error. Most often, if this error occurs, the following actions are recommended:
- Checking the spelling of the address
- Reload the page (click on the "Refresh" button or F5)
- Contacting the support service of the site on the page of which an error occurred
- Checking the device's Internet connection
- Checking antivirus settings (or browser)
What does "404 not found" mean?
Thus, the “404 not found” error occurs if the site does not work properly, the page is moved to another address and the address is entered incorrectly. In addition, this problem is often indicative of a weak (or missing) Internet connection.
Also, a 404 error can appear when the requested page is blocked by an antivirus or browser. This problem should be solved depending on the cause. If the desired page still shows a 404 error response, then the page does not exist.
The 404 error is the most recognized and common error in hypertext documents. She reports that the page does not exist at the given address. In fact, we are talking about the absence of an html file for the specified document, so the site returns an error.
To understand the issue in more detail, as well as with a number of service files that each resource has, you need to study the point related to the hypertext presentation of pages using the HTML language (HyperText Markup Language - "hypertext markup language"), and the HTTP protocol, through which is being accessed. Despite the fact that you have to understand the programming language, the form of its presentation is so simple that anyone can understand it.
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Hypertext pages and their features
The Internet was born at the moment when the English engineer Timothy John Berners-Lee invented a hypertext form for presenting text pages on the web and described the principle of access to them using the HTTP application protocol. According to the general idea, the user makes a network request for a specific resource from his device, namely from the browser. At this moment, a session is opened on the server being accessed. An HTML page is returned as a response.
Of course, in our time, more complex algorithms for access and "swapping" of large pages are used, but the general principle remains the same. To access the resource, you need a domain name and an IP address. Only on condition that these criteria are met and the resource is in working order, "error 404 not found" will be returned for the missing document.
What the default 404 page looks like
The site may or may not have a decorated "http 404 not found" access error page. A user with little experience is usually quite nervous when receiving it and believes that it is his fault. In fact, everything is much simpler, the answer follows from the above.
The 404 error code is returned as a separate page in the site design only if the site has a 404. html file. It is usually located in the root directory. Otherwise, the browser will display this error message along with a message about the lack of access. And it usually looks like a white sheet with an error message.
When developing sites, as a rule, site management systems are used. They contain a 404 page with the path to it in the functional files. Usually such a page contains a message about a non-existent address and a link to go to the main page of the site. The 404 page template can be customized as you wish, as this is a page on your site that you can use however you wish.
In order to redesign the template, you need knowledge of HTML to mark up the file. Please note that in some cases the page file may have a different name - err404. html, 404.php. The difference from the standard is most often associated with a wider functionality, as well as the features of the system. For example, in WordPress, the document can be found in the 404.php directory. In the address bar "404 error page not found" will be displayed like this: domain.ru / 404 /.
Adapting a standard 404 page to your goals
To improve the usability (acceptability) of the site, of course, you need to create a page that will attract the visitor to your site and help you continue browsing. Things to consider when writing code:
- A significant part of visitors who come across non-existent pages go to the site from search engines or through links on forums, sites and social networks, that is, from there, where old links to long-defunct pages may be located.
- Users are not looking for your site, but for information of interest by keyword, that is, in the absence of the desired, the visitor leaves the site and rarely views it.
That is, you must understand that it will not be so easy to keep such visitors, but it is possible!
Take a standard template available on the Internet, or make your own, taking into account the above features:
- Briefly explain to the person what happened and why they don't see what they were looking for. Show him options for further actions that will help him find what he is looking for.
- Display the search string on the 404 page so that the visitor can immediately find what they want.
- Be sure to display the menu of your site here, with the help of which a person can figure out where to go.
- Make the page attract the user, and he would like to find information on your resource. Use colorful and interesting text-visual solutions.
To make the page with the 404 error message attractive to the user, it is enough to make him smile or interest. Therefore, try to work on the originality of the idea for such a section of your resource.
Editing the 404 page
You can edit the file directly from the content management system, for this you need to add the desired markup and images.
When creating it, be guided by the fact that information should be opened quickly and without delays. The page should be "light" (take up little space), useful and offer alternatives to finding a non-existent document.
- go to home;
- list of rating pages of the site;
- go to the resource map;
- a button to inform the administration about a "broken" link on a specific source.
Otherwise, the best assistant will be imagination, corporate standards and the original idea of \u200b\u200bthe designer.
Conclusion
The 404 not found page is a service file that can be changed and supplemented to attract more visitors to the site. This file is required, because otherwise, the browser will display an error message, after which the chance to lure a person to you will be zero. Try to fill it with colorful images and even light humor.
Surely many of you have come across a situation where the browser refuses to load a certain page on the Internet, displaying a message about some "404 Error" instead. The reaction of users to such a message can be characterized in different ways: they treat it negatively or indifferently, they fear it or simply ignore it. Meanwhile, not everyone knows that in honor of this mistake, whole Internet projects and resource catalogs are created, contests and competitions are held, and finally, they even confess their love to her!
However, first things first.
Prose of life
First of all, let's understand what a "404 Error" is and in what cases it occurs. From a technical point of view, "Error 404" (or Error 404) is a status code header of the HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) protocol, which, as you know, is something like the basis of interaction between remote computers of the worldwide network. When the browser accesses the web server, the latter sends the code status of the requested document. If this request is processed correctly, the status is identical to the "200 OK" code. However, the user cannot see such a message due to the display of the content of the requested website in his browser. If the request for a document is processed by the browser with errors, the user observes a message with the status "404: Not Found".
What do these mysterious 404 numbers mean? The first number 4 indicates a client program error, i.e. browser. In this case, it is assumed that the site URL was typed incorrectly in the address bar of the browser or no longer physically exists on the requested server. The number 0 indicates a general protocol syntax error. Finally, the last four belongs to a separate category of 40x errors, which also includes such common statuses as "400: Bad Request" and "401: Unauthorized".
The 404 error myth
Some foreign sources interpret the decoding of the combination of numbers 404 somewhat differently. In particular, it is argued that the main database of the CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) scientific center, which took an active part in the development of the World Wide Web, was located on the 4th floor in room 404. And when the volume of processed data exceeded certain norms that no longer allow several scientists to simultaneously access the same file, the developers allegedly decided to display an error message like "Room 404: file not found".
However, this statement is refuted by one of the scientists who are part of the development team of the CERN center. According to him, “Room number 404 did not exist at all in the CERN laboratory due to a completely different office numbering system, according to which the first digit (author's note:“ 4 ”) meant the serial number of the building, and the combination of the second - the room number. it would be strange to speak of room 04, given the fact that the numbering at CERN started with 410. "
Causes and consequences
As mentioned above, according to the specification of the HTTP protocol, "Error 404" can be caused either by incorrect indication of the address (URL) of the requested site, or by the absence of a document on the web server. The proliferation of dial-up Internet connections in Russia adds another likely cause of the 404 error, namely poor connection to the provider's modem pool.
Memo for a surfer in a 404 situation
Go up one level in the URL structure and from there try to find the document you are looking for, for example: http://www.site.ru/docs/users/masha.html
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How is the user inclined to react when a 404 error message appears? In most cases, any attempts to download the necessary document are subsequently rejected in principle: people are used to appreciating the time they spend on the Internet and prefer to look for a similar resource that meets their requirements. At the same time, not everyone knows about the third reason for the probable "404 Error" - bad communication - therefore, he will not bother himself with repeated attempts to load the desired page.
"Error 404" may occur due to the fault of a web user who inattentively wrote down the address of an interesting site from the words of a friend, or typed the URL in the address bar of the browser with grammatical errors. Also, the webmaster is capable of "giving a blunder", who, when reorganizing the site structure or "cleaning" the server content, can delete this or that document as unnecessary (as it seems to him). If the latter is indexed by search engines, then it is quite possible that a nonexistent document will be displayed in the resulting list based on the user's search query. Or a specific Internet resource was once added to the browser "bookmarks" in order to refer to it as needed in the future. There are many such cases, and they all lead to the occurrence of "404 errors".
Expansion for the webmaster
The standard 404 error message is very austere and strict. But the most important thing is that in most cases it not only upsets the user, but also baffles him: he does not know what to do and ultimately, as a rule, leaves the server, which issues an error he does not understand. This is a big blunder of the webmaster, who thus loses his potential buyers, clients, customers, etc.
However, when accessing some of the web server settings, any webmaster (or system administrator) can customize the appearance of a standard "404: Not Found" message. It is difficult to imagine the scope for imagination and eloquence that opens up in this case for the developers of this or that Internet resource. Now you can direct the lost visitor in the right direction, suggest the desired address, and finally - just sympathize and redirect to the home page of your site. In other words, the dialogue between the service provider (which to some extent is almost any web resource) and the user is not broken even if an error occurs.
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Hobbies are different ...
Some collect postage stamps, others are fond of collecting buttons, and still others are in the eternal pursuit of rare coins. And there are people who collect all sorts of 404 errors! And there is a quite reasonable explanation for this: the rapid development of the Internet in general and the fine arts, in particular, has led to the emergence of various models of visual interpretation of the status of the 404 protocol: funny and sad, for children and adults, instructive and aggressive, etc.
For example, the directory of links of one of the most authoritative resources on "Error 404" - "404 Research Lab" has over 20 different subject categories containing many options for displaying "Error 404": "Funny", "Friendly", "Adult "," Useful "," Philosophical "," Shocking "," Unexpected ", etc. Another directory - 404Lounge.Net contains one of the largest galleries of" 404 Errors ", which includes more than 700 different variations of the message" 404: Not Found " ...
I loved you, what more? ...
The opening of "404 Errors" catalogs and subject headings, news feeds of events in the world "404: Not Found" and the creative delights of the webmasters of numerous servers in the design of the error message - this can still be somehow understood and logically explained. What do you think of writing 404-error odes and love dedications? Are you surprised? Don't believe me? Quite in vain, as evidenced by a fragment of a prosaic masterpiece titled "404: Purgatory: A Loving Tribute to a 404 Error" ("404 Purgatory: A Loving Tribute to 404 Not Found"):
"It is finished! You have learned the secret power of 404. You wander the nooks of the Internet all night long, you bought yourself a new modem and a fashionable ergonomic mouse. They will be useful to you. You, with the dexterity of a juggler, operate seven browser windows simultaneously and suddenly - 404. You do not believe your eyes, because this site opened last week. You click Refresh, with bated breath waiting for a miracle. Oh no! How could you be betrayed by these dishonest browser bookmarks? ... "
“Why are we leaving 404 so quickly? We don’t understand that 404 is an oasis of the Internet. It’s like a respite in the long and exhausting journey of a web surfer, like a breath of life-giving moisture in the middle of a parched desert ... Error 404 is full of mystery and intrigue. What we expect from browser? What joy do we have to learn? Will we be able to come back here again and again? 404 silently keeps this secret, and this makes people come back here again, in order to learn something new and unusual every time ... "
"Where there was darkness, now error 404. And the world is all right."
Of course, you should not take this interpretation of the essence of "404 Error" seriously: it is just a joke, a kind irony in relation to an ordinary life phenomenon. And the next time you see "404: Not Found" on your monitor, do not be discouraged and do not slander the sluggish webmaster: just smile when you remember the lines of this "love dedication".
This error means that the page the user is trying to view was not found or does not exist. In this case, the user himself will not be able to influence the solution of the issue. The only thing he can do is find similar information on the same site. For example, an address with an error www.example.com/not-founded-page.html replaced by www.example.com
Why is this happening?
This is due to the fact that the user went to the site page using the wrong link. For example, the user entered http://mysite.com/rbot.html in the browser (or followed the link), but it was necessary to - http://mysite.com/ro bot.html. Moreover, this link could be located both on your site and on third-party sites. You can find such links using Google Webmaster Tools. To do this, go to the page of this service , select your site, and then click: Status -\u003e Crawl Errors and select "Not Found".
The free program XenuLinks also copes well with this task, which you can download, and see the manual -.
How to fix 404 error?
In the traditional sense, it is impossible to correct this error, since the problem lies not in the operation of the server or the site engine, in the fact that someone incorrectly specified the link address. Therefore, the only way to fix it is to identify erroneous links and indicate the correct address. It is also worth checking if the current page exists on your site? If it has been removed, then make sure that it appears again. If it has been renamed, then you need to set up a 301 redirect from the old page address to the new one.
When a user comes to the site and sees this error through the server issue, he does not see your site (menu, navigation, design, etc.). Accordingly, it will close the page with a 100% probability. This scheme works on all hosts by default. But you can program this page and show your site with it. This means that the user seeing the main links of your site in the menu can click on them and stay on the site. Here are examples of incorrect and correct output, respectively:
There are many different ways to implement such a scheme, but the most universal one is to add this entry to the .htaccess file:
ErrorDocument 404 /error404.html
Accordingly, you will need to create the page "/error404.html" first.
