Member Avatar for gilgil2

Hi

I have added my new site to google webmaster tools but the most significant keywords that are appearing are ones to do with the php code used for the site, so 'array' is at the top and words included in the directory addresses appear for the rest of the top keywords. This is the first time I have used Joomla! CMS for a site, so is this just what happens with Joomla, or have I done something wrong?

I used for php for includes etc. on my other sites but never had this issue with keywords. I am just concerned that the keywords I want to target are not being recognised by Google as what the site is about.

Thanks in advance for any help.

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by canadafred

Dani AI

Generated

Short diagnosis and what to expect
If Google Webmaster Tools (Content Keywords / “top keywords”) shows things like “array” or directory names, that usually means those tokens appear in the HTML Google crawled — not that Joomla “always” does this. Common causes are leftover debug output, modules/templates that accidentally print PHP arrays or paths, error pages or directory listings being indexed, or a misconfigured server serving source instead of rendered pages. Fixing the output at source is the priority.

Practical, ordered checks

  • Inspect the HTML that Google actually saw (browser “View Source”, curl, or Webmasters’ “Fetch as Google”/cached snapshot) and search for visible occurrences of the problem token.
  • Grep the site for common debug/diagnostic output and accidental prints, for example:
grep -R --line-number -E "print_r|var_dump|debug|console_log" .
grep -R --line-number -i "Array" .

Remove any stray print_r/var_dump or accidental echo calls that render arrays or internal paths into the page.

Joomla-specific steps and hygiene
Disable Joomla debug and set error reporting to the least verbose level in Global Configuration; third-party extensions sometimes leave debug output enabled. Review template overrides and recent module installs for debugging code. Ensure Search Engine Friendly URLs and URL rewriting are configured correctly (and set up .htaccess when required) so internal component paths don’t leak into visible links. Confirm the server is executing PHP (no raw <?php in the served HTML) — if PHP source is being delivered, that’s a server configuration/security emergency.

After fixes
Use “Fetch as Google” (or the cached snapshot) to verify the cleaned HTML, then resubmit the sitemap and request reindexing. It can take days to weeks for keyword reports to update. Building on ’s point about checking what Google sees will quickly show whether the problem is raw output or something deeper.

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Member Avatar for lizatailor23

Superb post & writing skills. You make this look easy. Keep it up for great work. I will be back to read more of your posts.

Member Avatar for canadafred

I'd think that maybe you have some sloppy code whereas the search engine crawler cannot determine what constitutes content and what is part of a string of code. Make sure you have all of your tags closed ie </script>.

Also you can check your Google cache to make sure that it has correctly discovered things like your important text.

Edited by canadafred because: n/a
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