Magento - Add custom modules to Google sitemap - php

Question

I have custom modules (that I bought or developed) that have frontend pages in my store.
How can I include these pages in the Google sitemap Magento generates?

Answer 1

The function that generates the sitemap is: Mage_Sitemap_Model_Sitemap::generateXml()
which does the following:
open file and write xml header
get the category collection and write it to sitemap file
get the products collection and write it to sitemap file
get the CMS collection and write it to sitemap file
close the sitemap xml file
No event is dispatched before closing the xml file... in this case you can extend this Mage_Sitemap_Model_Sitemap and override the generateXml() function adding your own custom URLs (if these urls are not in any of the above collections: category, product, cms page)
Another approach to your issue is using multiple sitemap files and a sitemap index file (Google Supports this: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2006/10/multiple-sitemaps-in-same-directory.html). In this case, you can have a separate module to generate the 2nd xml sitemap file.

Answer 2

Magento did add the events sitemap_products_generating_before and sitemap_categories_generating_before in later versions (I don't know when, my version is 1.9.2). So in case you stumple upon this thread like me, looking for the best way to add custom modules' pages to the Google Sitemap, this is how simple it is with these events:
In my case I have a custom module that creates dynamic "News" pages, so I add an event listener to the <global> tag in my module's config.xml. I chose to go with the product sitemap event*:
<events>
<sitemap_products_generating_before>
<observers>
<{your_unique_event_observer_name}>
<class>{Brand}_{Module}_Model_Observer</class>
<method>addPagesToSitemap</method>
</{your_unique_event_observer_name}>
</observers>
</sitemap_products_generating_before>
</events>
And then, in my module's Observer, I let the method addPagesToSitemap add extra items to the product collection (or category collecton, if you went with the category sitemap event):
class {Brand}_{Module}_Model_Observer
{
function addPagesToSitemap(Varien_Event_Observer $observer){
$sitemapItems = $observer->getEvent()->getCollection()->getItems();
// Get your module's page collection including their urls
// Adjust the following lines to your needs
$collection = Mage::getModel('{brand}_{module}/pages')->getCollection()
->addFieldToSelect(array('page_id','url'))
->addFieldToFilter('display', 1);
// My module stores the page path separately,
// you might don't need this:
$modulePagePath = Mage::helper('{my-modules-helper}')->getNewsPath();
foreach($collection as $_item){
$varienObject = new Varien_Object();
// We don't want to override
// any existing product/category items
$uniqueId = '{module}'.$_item->getPageId();
$varienObject->setId($uniqueId);
// You might want to adjust this if your item
// stores the complete url. Don't add the base url tho,
// Mage_Sitemap_Model_Sitemap::generateXml adds it
$varienObject->setUrl($modulePagePath . DS . $_item->getUrl());
$sitemapItems[$uniqueId] = $varienObject;
}
$observer->getEvent()->getCollection()->setItems($sitemapItems);
return $this;
}
}
That's it. You can test it by manually generating your sitemap under Catalog > Google Sitemap.
*For some reasons Magento did not add an event "sitemap_pages_generating_before", so you have to either choose the products' or category's event to go with. For both events Magento takes the respective changefreq- and priority-value set for category & product pages in your Magento configuration. So just choose the event which values fit better.