Multi-tiered sitemap?

2
votes

From: http://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html :

If you want to list more than 50,000 URLs, you must create multiple Sitemap files <...> If you do provide multiple Sitemaps, you should then list each Sitemap file in a Sitemap index file. Sitemap index files may not list more than 50,000 Sitemaps and must be no larger than 10MB (10,485,760 bytes) and can be compressed. You can have more than one Sitemap index file.

Is it possible then to create a 3- or more tiered chain? For example:

//mysite/sitemap.xml is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<sitemapindex xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
    <sitemap>
        <loc>http://mysite/sitemaps/index.xml</loc>
        <lastmod>2004-10-01T18:23:17+00:00</lastmod>
    </sitemap>
</sitemapindex>

//mysite/sitemaps/index.xml is: 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<sitemapindex xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
    <sitemap>
        <loc>http://mysite/sitemaps/sitemap-lm.xml.gz</loc>
    </sitemap>
    <sitemap>
        <loc>http://mysite/sitemaps/sitemap-1.xml.gz</loc>
    </sitemap>
   ....
</sitemapindex>

and //mysite/sitemaps/sitemap-lm.xml.gz is a normal gzipped XML-file, passing validation and so on.

Id est:

/robots.txt -> /sitemap.xml -> /sitemaps/sitemapslist.xml -> /sitemaps/sitemap-1.xml.gz

The specification doesn't give a clear answer.

Google and personal input both have yelded inconclusive and contradictory answers, ranging from "sure, why not" to "no, because nobody does it that way".

Any ideas would be welcome!

1
seositemap
You can have more than one Sitemap index file. gives clue - Iłya Bursov
@Lashane , can I use chained sitemap index? - Arris
yes, why not, standard says you can use multiple indexes - Iłya Bursov

1 Answers

0
votes

No, I don't think you can proceed that way, but there is nothing preventing you from declaring multiple <sitemapindex> sitemaps in your robots.txt with multiple sitemap:<path-to-a-sitemap-index-sitemap> lines in it.

Your robots.txt would be the 1st level, the listed <sitemapindex> sitemaps would be the second level, and the real sitemaps would be the 3rd level.