For many years now Cybersalt has used Weeblr.com's Joomla extension Sh404SEF for managing the Search Engine Friendly (SEF) urls on our sites, and those of many of our clients. Sh404SEF also had a lot of features for managing Search Engine Optimization (SEO) on Joomla sites, but this was an area of Sh404SEF we seldom ventured into.
Well before the release of Joomla 4, we learned that Sh404SEF would not be updated for J4. Instead, it would be replaced by 2 extensions that would each cover off the two different Sh404 functions mendtioned above: 4SEF and 4SEO.
4SEF is a simplified version of Sh404SEF that focuses primarily on URL management and redirects. It is designed to be more user-friendly and accessible for less experienced Joomla users. This is great news because having 4SEF on it's own makes it easier to get the most out of SEF urls in both your Joomla 3 and 4 sites.
The biggest question users of Sh404SEF who are moving to 4SEF have is, "Will I loose my current SEF urls, aliases, and other settings if switch to 4SEF?" The answer is a wonderful, "No!" 4SEF has an import tool which will bring all of your Sh404SEF settings and data into 4SEF. This means that your SEF urls setup can be recreated in your Joomla 3 site and will remain unchanged when you migrate to Joomla 4!
Likewise, you can install 4SEO on your Joomla 3 site, set it up, and start using it before you migrate to Joomla 4. 4SEO is a newer extension that provides a comprehensive set of tools for optimizing Joomla websites for search engines. It includes features such as content analysis, keyword optimization, and schema markup support.
We've not seen the same import feature to move the SEO parts of Sh404SEF over to 4SEO, but you can still have both open in the backend of your Joomla site and "easily" move data from one to the other - that is if you were using any of the SEO parts of Sh404SEF. And once again, having 4SEO on its own makes it easier to get the most out of your Joomla site's SEO using this great tool
Both 4SEF and 4SEO are extensions we use and maintain on client sites through our Monthly Joomla Maintenance Package, and honestly, we're thrilled with the changes that have come out of Sh404SEf being discontinued, but also reborn as the two separate and powerful extensions.
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