How best to redirect a webpage without using Javascript?

Question

I have some script in my default page that redirects users to language specific versions of my website depending on the language of the browser. I want to add something that redirects those users who do NOT have Javascript enabled.

Currently I have the following :

<noscript>
  <META HTTP-EQUIV=REFRESH CONTENT="1; URL=en/index.htm">.
</noscript>

But I've read this is not too wise as some search engines frown upon it. How do I do this and keep search engines happy?

Answer 1

You should use a .htaccess file to detect the browser's language from the headers (using a regular expression) and then redirect them that way. Doing that is completely agnostic of the client-side configuration and search engines will handle it properly. There is a ton of information out there on specifically how to accomplish this.

Answer 2

It could be done with a server side language by adding the following http header

Location: /en/index

will redirect the user to http://www.example.com/en/index

Answer 3

You'll need to parse the Accept-Language HTTP header.

Answer 4

Why don't you redirect on the server side, by responding with a 302 HTTP status code. I don't know what you have on the server, but all frameworks support it.

Answer 5

You can redirect at server side with 301 HTTP status code too. This is the best way to do it for good SEO. The example is in C# but every plattform has his own method to add headers to the response:

Response.Clear();
Response.Status = "301 Moved Permanently";
Response.AddHeader("Location", "/newfolder/newfilelocation");

The reason to use the 301 status code is that the search engine indexes the new page because it was "Moved permanently" instead of the 302 that was "Moved temporarily".