Redirection for pages that no longer exist

Hey @Aleksandar34715023f1z9 Did you find a solution yet?

For your specific need while hosting on IIS, you don't even need to use ColdFusion.  You can use a web.config IIS rewrite rule. (Just make sure you have the IIS Rewrite module installed already.)

Here's a sample web..config rule for permanently redirecting the root "Aion" directory:

<system.webServer>
  <!-- Other configuration settings... -->
  <rewrite>
    <rules>
      <rule name="Redirect Aion to New Path" stopProcessing="true">
        <match url="^Aion/(.*)" ignoreCase="true"/>
        <conditions>
          <add negate="true" input="{SCRIPT_FILENAME}" matchType="IsFile"/>
        </conditions>
        <action type="Redirect" url="/Computer/Games/Aion/{R:1}" appendQueryString="true" redirectType="Permanent" />
      </rule>
    </rules>
  </rewrite>
  <!-- Other configuration settings... -->
</system.webServer>

We spider websites of new clients that we acquire before we convert their website to ColdFusion.  We do this to identify links that may be broken as a result of URL changes so that they don't suffer SEO-wise.

We use IIS and prefer using either a "rewriteMaps" web.config rule (w/301 permanent redirects) or writing IIS rewrite rules to take the full URL and pass it the path as a URL parameter for processing by CF. (This allows us to catch rules where dynamical values are being passed via the URL... be sure to add appendQueryString="true" to the action.)

Here are some articles regarding IIS rewrites/redirects.
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/37280888/iis-url-rewrite-subfolder-to-another-folder-name
https://www.rewriteguide.com/iis-redirect-directories-to-another-directory/

Here's an article on how to add all your rules to a separate file.  (NOTE: This has been our approach... we use ColdFusion to enable our clients to add their own rules and auto-generate the "rewritemaps.config" file.
https://ruslany.net/2010/05/storing-url-rewrite-mappings-in-a-separate-file/

... Is it possible to do this in Application.cfc ...?

By @Aleksandar34715023f1z9

Yes, it is possible to do it in Application.cfc. 

The relevant Application.cfc is the one situated in the directory /Aion.

There are three cases to consider:

1.  For every CFM file in /Computer/Games/Aion/ (new location), there is a CFM of the same name in /Aion (old location).
   You could then do the redirection in onRequestStart, as follows:
   

   <cffunction name="onRequestStart">
   	<cfargument name = "targetPage" type="String" required="true">
   	<!--- Determines whether to redirect request in the case of a currently existing CFM page --->
   	<cfset var toBeRedirected = false>
    	<cfset toBeRedirected = findNoCase("Computer/Games/Aion", arguments.targetPage) EQ 0>
    	<cfif toBeRedirected>
    		<cfset var newTargetPage = replaceNoCase(arguments.targetPage, "Aion", "Computer/Games/Aion", "one")>
    		<cflocation url="#newTargetPage#" statuscode="301" addtoken="no">	 		
    	</cfif>
   
   	<cfreturn true>
   </cffunction>​

2. For each CFM file in /Computer/Games/Aion/ (new location) , there is no corresponding CFM file of the same name in /Aion (old location).
   You could then do the redirection in onMissingTemplate, as follows:
   

   <cffunction name="onMissingTemplate">
   	<cfargument name = "targetPage" type="String" required="true">
   	<!--- Determines whether to redirect request in the case of a currently non-existent CFM page --->
   	<cfset var toBeRedirected = false>
    	<cfset toBeRedirected = findNoCase("Computer/Games/Aion", arguments.targetPage) EQ 0>
    	<cfif toBeRedirected>
    		<cfset var newTargetPage = replaceNoCase(arguments.targetPage, "Aion", "Computer/Games/Aion", "one")>
    		<cflocation url="#newTargetPage#" statuscode="301" addtoken="no">	 		
    	</cfif>
   
   	<cfreturn true>
   </cffunction>​

3.  For some CFM files in /Computer/Games/Aion/ (new location) , there are corresponding CFM files of the same name in /Aion (old location).  But there are CFM files in /Computer/Games/Aion/  for which there are no corresponding CFM files of the same name in /Aion. 
   You could then do the redirection in both event-handlers.:
   
   
   
   
    

Aleksandar, before answering, are you more a business person or a programmer? Do you only manage this site, I mean? And/or only edit the site content, perhaps tweaking html vs writing cfml code?

I ask because while you certainly COULD solve this problem via cfml in Application.cfc, if you're a developer I'd expect you'd just code it up. If you're not a developer, you maybe asking one of us to code it up. Someone else may offer that. I tend not to care to, as there are often other considerations not mentioned so it could be a lot of back and forth. In my opinion it's really not effective to use these forums for that sort of back and forth development of a coding solution.

But perhaps you're simply asking what folks think of your idea: it could work.

Really, though, this IS a problem typically better-solved via web server rewrite/redirect solutions. You mention htaccess. Some would argue you'd be better off figuring how to solve this there...but of course this is not the best place to ask about that. Some here may have that specific experience. We'll see.

But you could ask the question of a community related to htaccess, or the apache web server I assume you're using. No need to mention cf there, and thankfully your examples have no cfm files. You may find it's quite easy to get what you want.

But sure, some people would prefer to "just code the solution in cfml", and fair enough. But that then leads back to my first couple of questions. 🙂 You can help us help you.

Or again someone else may just offer some code for you based only on what you asked.