How to Customise Your Workflow Parameters#

Using the flexible parameters, you can submit individual or multiple URLs, or even entire or partial sitemaps, to IndexNow on a regular basis. Find out how based on the following example:

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name: Submit Sitemap URLs to IndexNow

on:
  schedule:
    - cron: 0 0 1 * *  # Run at midnight UTC on the 1st day of each month.

jobs:
  submit-sitemap:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - name: Submit sitemap URLs to IndexNow
        uses: jakob-bagterp/index-now-submit-sitemap-urls-action@v2
        with:
          host: example.com
          api_key: ${{ secrets.INDEX_NOW_API_KEY }}
          api_key_location: https://example.com/${{ secrets.INDEX_NOW_API_KEY }}.txt
          endpoint: naver, seznam, yep
          urls: https://example.com
          sitemap_locations: https://example.com/sitemap.xml
          sitemap_filter: section1
          sitemap_days_ago: 2
          retries: 3

Overview#

Parameters#

host#

Contains the domain (and subdomain) of your website. Required every time you submit any URLs or sitemaps to the IndexNow API.

For example, if the URL to your sitemap is https://example.com, then the host parameter should be example.com:

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          host: example.com

Or if your website URL is https://www.example.com, then the host should be www.example.com:

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          host: www.example.com

api_key#

The API key for IndexNow, e.g. a1b2c3d4. Required every time you submit any URLs or sitemaps to the IndexNow API.

You need to set an API key on your website to verify ownership of your domain. This should be kept secret and is required every time you submit a URL to the IndexNow API:

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          api_key: ${{ secrets.INDEX_NOW_API_KEY }}

If you don't want to use the API key generator from Microsoft Bing, you can create your own API key.

api_key_location#

The location of the API key, e.g. https://example.com/a1b2c3d4.txt. Required every time you submit any URLs or sitemaps to the IndexNow API.

Similar to the api_key, the location of your API key should be kept secret:

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          api_key_location: https://example.com/${{ secrets.INDEX_NOW_API_KEY }}.txt

endpoint#

Optional. The search engine endpoint, e.g. indexnow, bing, naver, seznam, yandex, yep. If not specified, Bing is used as the default endpoint. Any other value makes the workflow fail before anything is submitted, so a typo doesn't go unnoticed.

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          endpoint: seznam

Fall Back to Other Endpoints#

Sometimes an endpoint is temporarily unavailable or rejects submissions for a specific site. Instead of a single endpoint, provide a list of endpoints. They are tried in order, and the submission stops at the first endpoint that accepts it:

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          endpoint: naver, seznam, yep

Alternatively over multiple lines, if that's easier to read:

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          endpoint: >
            naver
            seznam
            yep

The submission falls back to the next endpoint if the endpoint can't be reached, responds with a server error, 429 Too Many Requests or 403 Forbidden. Other errors, such as 400 Bad Request, indicate a problem with the submission itself, so the workflow fails without trying the remaining endpoints. Learn more about the fallback strategy in the IndexNow for Python documentation.

urls#

Optional. The URL(s) to be submitted to IndexNow. Can be an individual URL, e.g. https://example.com:

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          urls: https://example.com

Or multiple URLs as list:

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          urls: https://example.com/page1 https://example.com/page2

Alternatively over multiple lines, if that's easier to read:

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          urls: >
            https://example.com/page1
            https://example.com/page2

sitemap_locations#

Optional. The location of the sitemap(s) from which the URLs will be submitted to IndexNow. Can be an individual sitemap, e.g. https://example.com/sitemap.xml:

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          sitemap_locations: https://example.com/sitemap.xml

Or multiple sitemaps as list:

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          sitemap_locations: https://example.com/sitemap1.xml https://example.com/sitemap2.xml

Alternatively over multiple lines, if that's easier to read:

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          sitemap_locations: >
            https://example.com/sitemap1.xml
            https://example.com/sitemap2.xml

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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
    <sitemap>
        <loc>https://example.com/sitemap1.xml</loc>
    </sitemap>
    <sitemap>
        <loc>https://example.com/sitemap2.xml</loc>
    </sitemap>
</urlset>

sitemap_filter#

Optional. Only submit sitemap URLs that contain the filter string, e.g. section1. Optional.

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          sitemap_filter: section1

Or filter the sitemap URLs for both section1 and section2 using a regular expression:

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          sitemap_filter: "r'(section1)|(section2)'"

Alternatively, imagine that you want to prevent a whole section from being submitted. This can be achieved using a negative regular expression. This will match any URL that does not include the string /section1/:

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          sitemap_filter: "r'^((?!/section1/).)*$'"

sitemap_days_ago#

Optional. Only submit sitemap URLs that have been modified recently based on the <lastmod> tag, e.g. 1, 2, or more days ago.

For example, all sitemap URLs that have been modified in the last week days will be submitted:

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          sitemap_days_ago: 7

Or only submit sitemap URLs that have been modified since yesterday:

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          sitemap_days_ago: 1

Or only submit sitemap URLs that have been modified today:

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          sitemap_days_ago: 0

retries#

Optional. Number of times to retry a request on temporary errors, such as dropped connections, timeouts, 429 Too Many Requests or server errors like 503 Service Unavailable. By default, it's set to 0, which means that requests are not retried. Enable retries, so a short glitch at the search engine doesn't make your workflow fail:

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          retries: 3

Between retries, the wait time increases exponentially (0, 2, 4 seconds, etc.). Other errors, such as 400 Bad Request or 403 Forbidden, aren't retried, as sending the same request again gives the same result.

If you have provided multiple endpoints, each endpoint is retried before the submission falls back to the next one.

Learn more about retries and timeouts in the IndexNow for Python documentation.