A funny thing happened on the way to the new hosting company. The site was transferred but the domain name was not pointed yet. This is the intermediate stage when you must check to make sure everything works. Only then can you point the domain name to the new host with any confidence.

So - the entire site was there and it displayed except for one thing. The posts didn’t display. Instead there was a cryptic message saying, ‘Oops - you are looking for something that isn’t here’. WHAT? The header, sidebar and footer were fine. I knew the database was there because the categories in the sidebar were there and they are contained in the database. Besides, I looked at the database and the post records were there.

It was time for a note to support. The message I got back was that the support person saw everything ‘fine’. I fired back an e-mail telling him that it was NOT fine - the posts were not displaying. In return he said that I had SEF URLs and I would have to turn them off in order to see the posts before the domain was pointed. Huh? What in the world are SEF URLs?

I puzzled over that for awhile until I suddenly knew what they are - Search Engine Friendly URLs. But how could I ‘turn them off’ if I didn’t know how I had turned them on in the first place? Then it struck me - it’s the Permalink Structure! It’s that very important option in WordPress that makes the post titles mean something.

As soon as that light turned on, I decided to take a chance and point the domain name to the new host. You are now reading this at the new hosting company and all is well.

So - if anyone talks about SEF URLs in reference to WordPress, you’ll know what that means. If Permalink Structure is Greek to you, we’ll talk about that shortly. Look in Options in the dashboard and you will see Permalink Structure. Yes - it’s important. It’s what makes your post titles search engine friendly.