Sitemap has errors (blank entry)

Hi @antforshaw,

It seems one of the pages (not posts) reports back an empty URL.
I don’t know why as I currently don’t have access to a test site, but I urge you to check out the visibility (custom canonical URL) settings of the missing page and adjust it if necessary.

I’ll review this bug in-depth in a few hours. In the meantime, if you’ve found the cause, please let me know ??

Cheers!

Hi Sybre,

Thanks for your reply. I’ve checked each of the pages and haven’t been able to pinpoint which is the offending one. I think there is a possibility that it is something to do with the theme I’m using on our site.

Also, there are various reusable “blocks” of code that are in use on our website and they are being included in the sitemap too, not sure how I can stop this from happening. Is there a way to prevent certain URL patterns from being included?

<url>
<loc>https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/demos/</loc>
<priority>0.1</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/footer-newsletter-signup/
</loc>
<priority>0.1</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/footer-about-us/
</loc>
<priority>0.1</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/shop-category-slider/
</loc>
<priority>0.0</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/shop-header/
</loc>
<priority>0.0</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/blog-header/
</loc>
<priority>0.0</priority>
</url>
<url>
<loc>
https://www.newstaticsforsale.co.uk/blocks/elements-overview/
</loc>
<priority>0.0</priority>
</url>

Hi @antforshaw,

Regarding the blocks: Please contact the plugin/theme author of the blocks in question.
The “blocks” CPT shouldn’t have rewrite capabilities, as they shouldn’t be queried by visitors.

I see you’re using a substitutional sitemap. I’m glad you’ve been able to find a (temporarily) solution as I continue working on the initially reported issue ??

For good measure, could you inform me of what the wp-admin/options-reading.php page’s “Your homepage displays” settings yield? Does any of it have a value of a page that no longer exists?

Hi @cybr

Yes, just to keep our sitemap working I had to substitute another one ??

The homepage setting is set to static page, the actual homepage, so it does exist.

I’ll contact the theme authors as it does look like they need to make a few tweaks to the way blocks work.

Many thanks again,

Anthony

Thanks for all the information, Anthony!

Through a little bit of fiddling, I found the cause of the issue. And, I’ve opened a GitHub issue with all the information:
https://github.com/sybrew/the-seo-framework/issues/242

Because the 3.0.x release branch won’t receive any more updates–unless there’s a security issue–, the bug will be fixed with the 3.1.0 release, which I hope to have released by February.

To resolve this issue in the meantime, you should publish the assigned blog page and set it to private. Because there’s a known resolution, I’ve marked this topic as resolved.
However, if what I’ve found isn’t the reason you’re experiencing this issue, do let me know by following up ?? Thanks!