PageSpeed Insights SEO Issue: Links are not crawlable

[sadams101]

Can you please look into a fix for this issue, which affects both Mobile and Desktop versions of any forum post that includes a quote (this happens on nearly every thread in my forum).

Example URL:
https://www.celiac.com/forums/topic/158184-link-between-celiac-and-globulin-or-eosinophils/

View Issue on PageSpeed Insights:
https://pagespeed.web.dev/analysis/https-www-celiac-com-forums-topic-158184-link-between-celiac-and-globulin-or-eosinophils/do1q1usgq0?form_factor=mobile

Error:

• Links are not crawlable
• Search engines may use href attributes on links to crawl websites. Ensure that the href attribute of anchor elements links to an appropriate destination, so more pages of the site can be discovered. Learn how to make links crawlable

 

[Jim M]

I have reported this internally. However, I don't think you want them to index the expand truncated quote link anyway so likely this will be altered 😉 . Ultimately, it's not hurting you or helping you but definitely something we should review.

[SeNioR-]

Referring to the topic "Links are not crawlable" and toggleQuote is Creating Errors in PageSpeed, you can also improve the spoiler code.

javascript.xml

ips.templates.set('core.editor.spoilerHeader', " \
	<div class='ipsSpoiler_header ipsSpoiler_closed'>\
		<a href='#' data-action='toggleSpoiler'>&nbsp;</a>\
		<span>{{#lang}}spoilerClickToReveal{{/lang}}</span>\
	</div>\
");

to

ips.templates.set('core.editor.spoilerHeader', " \
	<div class='ipsSpoiler_header ipsSpoiler_closed'>\
		<a href='#' data-action='toggleSpoiler' aria-label='{{#lang}}toggle_spoiler{{/lang}}>&nbsp;</a>\
		<span>{{#lang}}spoilerClickToReveal{{/lang}}</span>\
	</div>\
");

Temporary JS fix:

{{if !\IPS\Member::loggedIn()->member_id and \in_array( \IPS\Dispatcher::i()->controller, array( 'topic', 'page' ) )}}
<script async>
$(document).ready(function() {
$('.ipsQuote_citation a.ipsPos_right').remove();

$('.ipsSpoiler_header a[data-action="toggleSpoiler"]').attr({
'title': '{lang="topic_approve"}',
'aria-label': '{lang="topic_approve"}'});
  
$('.ipsQuote a.ipsTruncate_more').attr({
'title': '{lang="expand"}',
'href': '#',
'onclick': 'return false;',
'rel': 'nofollow'});
});
</script>
{{endif}}

[sadams101]

@Jim M, Google is definitely deducting points for this issue, the question is how many. It would not be listed as an error there if there were no deductions for it. It would be great if this simple fix could be included in the next update.

@SeNioR-, thanks for this. My experience with the modifying the IPB JS is that the changes won't stick, so this really needs to applied in an IPB update, is that correct?

 

[Marc]

10 hours ago, sadams101 said:

@Jim M, Google is definitely deducting points for this issue, the question is how many. It would not be listed as an error there if there were no deductions for it. It would be great if this simple fix could be included in the next update.

 

As mentioned by my colleague, a bug report has been added for this. We cannot guarantee a version a bug fix will be in 

[sadams101]

I just want to mention that since I have fixed all other SEO issues in on my site that were found in Google's PageSpeed Insights, the issue I brought up in this thread regarding the Links that are not crawlable is bringing my SEO score down by 8 points--so I score 92 instead of 100 (other similar pages on my site without these type of uncrawlable links score 100). This is a significant hit by Google, and it's clear that they don't like these uncrawlable links at all, and as will all things Google, this negative score could grow over time.

My hope is that your team will look into a better solution that will not cause us all to be penalized, as I think there is likely a simple solution for this (perhaps the one that @SeNioR- posted here?). 

Edited June 5 by sadams101

[sadams101]

Since this is still an issue in the latest version, I am circling back to see if this is slated for a future update? 

[Jim M]

I'm afraid, this is not something which will be fixing for version 4.