Automatic tt_news META descriptions via Acqal's extension aqnewsmeta

No need for extension. Here is a simple TS for the same purpose:

page.headerData {
200 = TEXT
200.data = page:keywords
200.required = 1
200.wrap = <meta name="keywords" content="|" />
200.htmlspecialchars = 1

210 = TEXT
210.data = page:description
210.required = 1
210.wrap = <meta name="description" content="|" />
210.htmlspecialchars = 1
}
[globalVar = GP:tx_ttnews|tt_news > 0]
page.headerData.200.override.data = register:newsKeywords
page.headerData.210.override.data = register:newsSubheader
[global]

Dmitry,

Thank you for the code suggestion. I had seen this before.

1. Why do you generate the meta tag fully instead of letting TYPO3 do so via the following?

page.meta.keywords = {$site.meta.keywords}

page.meta.keywords.if.isTrue = {$site.sitewide.seo}

page.meta.keywords.override.field = keywords



page.meta.description = {$site.meta.description}

page.meta.description.if.isTrue = {$site.sitewide.seo}

page.meta.description.override.field = description

The above code lets a global SEO setting be made and in turn be overridden by SEO settings in page properties.

2. Your code doesn't account for there being no tt_news.short data. The extension does by checking for the tt_news.short field and if there's nothing, then cropping tt_news.bodytext down to size. See http://typo3.org/extensions/repository/view/aqnewsmeta/current/info/class.tx_aqnewsmeta.php/.

In reality, your code and the aqnewsmeta extension can work side-by-side still because aqnewsmeta is updating register:newsSubheader with data one way or another.

3. On our article pages, we use the following TypoScript for news meta tags.

page.meta.keywords >

page.meta.keywords.data = register:newsKeywords



page.meta.description >

page.meta.description.data = register:newsSubheader

Your thoughts?

On a side note, it's not recommended to use sitewide SEO settings as search engines really ding websites with them. However, sometimes clients ask for stuff and won't take best practices to heart. So it's there...

1. I just like header data
2. I provided an example, not a fully working solution. My point is that there is no need for extension when it can be done with pure TS :) I use similar code on my own blog.
3. There is a research about how search engines use these tags. I do not remember who published it but the link was a couple of weeks ago at seomoz. It was tested with Google, Yahoo and Live.

Dmitry, thank you again for the comments.

However, I really think you're missing the point of the extension. It's not to generate the META tag, but to populate the register:newsSubheader with truncated, HTML free news bodytext when the news teaser is empty.

This is something that's not possible by TypoScript. Sure TypoScript has REGISTER access, but it doesn't readily have the tt_news record information handy.

I know it's possible to pull the tt_news record via RECORDS, but we're getting to the point of creating something most folks don't get.

Here's the TypoScript to pull the news short or bodytext. I'm still trying to figure out how to push it to page.meta.description, such that the meta description tag is created correctly without resorting to generating my own page.headerData entry.

lib.news.meta.description = RECORDS

lib.news.meta.description {

        dontCheckPid = 1

        tables = tt_news

        source.data = GPvar:tx_ttnews|tt_news

        source.insertData = 1

        conf.tt_news = TEXT

        conf.tt_news {

        	field = short

        	ifEmpty.field = bodytext

        	required = 1

        	htmlSpecialChars = 0

        	crop = 150|...|1

        	stripHtml = 1

        	trim = 1

        }

}

Ideas to improve this are welcome.

Okay, I figured how to get what I wanted with TypoScript and simplify things a little.

I'm already using the awesome seo_basics extension and I decided to add onto their TypoScript setup. In my changes, 'm also defaulting my page meta description to the page title, when there's no page description.

Next, there's the start of my canonical link tag. However, the exclude property isn't working for array type parameters like tx_ttnews[tt_news] for being removed from category pages. Frustrating...

Also, when on news pages, meta description tries for the news article short text, but if none, it grabs and crops the bodytext.

# if no page description or default, at least bring in page title

plugin.tx_seobasics.40.ifEmpty.data = page:title



# create canonical tag

plugin.tx_seobasics.60 = TEXT

plugin.tx_seobasics.60 < .30

plugin.tx_seobasics.60 {

	stdWrap >

	typolink {

		parameter.data = TSFE:id

		addQueryString = 1

		addQueryString {

			method = GET

			exclude = id,tx_ttnews[backPid]

		}

		returnLast = url

	}

	wrap = <link rel="canonical" href="|" />

}



# keep article links out of canonical urls

[globalVar = GP:tx_ttnews|cat > 0]

	plugin.tx_seobasics.60.typolink.addQueryString.exclude = id,tx_ttnews[tt_news],tx_ttnews[backPid]

[global]



[globalVar = GP:tx_ttnews|tt_news > 0]

	plugin.tx_seobasics.30.stdWrap >

	plugin.tx_seobasics.30.data = register:newsKeywords



	plugin.tx_seobasics.40.stdWrap >

	plugin.tx_seobasics.40.data = register:newsSubheader

	plugin.tx_seobasics.40.ifEmpty >

	plugin.tx_seobasics.40.ifEmpty.cObject = RECORDS

	plugin.tx_seobasics.40.ifEmpty.cObject {

		dontCheckPid = 1

		tables = tt_news

		source.data = GPvar:tx_ttnews|tt_news

		source.insertData = 1

		conf.tt_news = TEXT

		conf.tt_news {

			field = short

			ifEmpty.field = bodytext

			required = 1

			htmlSpecialChars = 0

			crop = 150|...|1

			stripHtml = 1

			trim = 1

		}

	}

[global]

As the code above does what I want it to do and doesn't cause the tt_news extension to spend extra cycles or time to generate a page, I've turned off the extension aqnewsmeta. I'd suggest for you to do the same.