Best way to do bread crumbs

[toolmania1]

Hello all,

I was wondering the best way to do bread crumbs. I just noticed that I was having to hard code each bread crumb as a link pointing to the next link. I had to do this for every page. Is there a better way?

 

[Phreaddee]

that all depends on the cms you are using.
some do breadcrumbs better than others...

 

[toolmania1]

I write all of my code by hand. ( Maybe I am old fashioned...lol ) Am I missing out on easier ways?

 

[ronaldroe]

Maybe not a CMS, but definitely some kind of server-side scripting.

 

[toolmania1]

I researched and found jquery can handle this well.

 

[chrishirst]

using javascript to create them will mean that they will be invisible to search engines and some accessibilty user agents.

 

[leroy30]

Create a user control with server-side script that uses regular expressions to iterate through each 'folder' or other meaningful component in the requested URI and dynamically build it that way.

That is assuming you have used a clean folder-based structure. i.e. mywebsite.com/folder1 will show content as will mywebsite.com/folder1/folder2

As long as you structure everything ok then it beats a database solution in terms of simplicity anyway. Great for smaller websites.

What server-side language are you using?

 

[Edge]

I write all of my code by hand. ( Maybe I am old fashioned...lol ) Am I missing out on easier ways?

Yes - 9 out of 10 CMSs would have either inbuilt functionality that already does this or a plugin for it.

 

[toolmania1]

using javascript to create them will mean that they will be invisible to search engines and some accessibilty user agents.

If I have other links on the site that link to those pages, will it matter that the bread crumbs are invisible?

Also, what is the downfall of them being invisible?

( I see your point, I just want to understand more about this )

 

[toolmania1]

Create a user control with server-side script that uses regular expressions to iterate through each 'folder' or other meaningful component in the requested URI and dynamically build it that way.

That is assuming you have used a clean folder-based structure. i.e. mywebsite.com/folder1 will show content as will mywebsite.com/folder1/folder2

As long as you structure everything ok then it beats a database solution in terms of simplicity anyway. Great for smaller websites.

What server-side language are you using?

======
I am using php. I understand what you are saying not sure where to start. I edited this post though. I did research php real quick. I did find some examples of this. I will post back if I get it to work. Maybe I do know where to start...lol

 

[chrishirst]

If I have other links on the site that link to those pages, will it matter that the bread crumbs are invisible?

Also, what is the downfall of them being invisible?

( I see your point, I just want to understand more about this )

It reduces the accessibility and usability of your document URLs and for SEs it may not matter at all BUT "breadcrumb trails" provide more "entry points" into your site and can help with URL discovery and getting ALL the URL indexed.