The Numbers to Know: Response Status Codes

Have you ever received a 404 error when loading pages? How about a 500 error? Or a 403? If you are like a lot of people browsing the web you have probably seen those but you may not know what all those numbers mean. If you run a website though, it is important to know what those numbers mean so that you can better understand problems that may be happening on your website.

Let's start at the beginning. When you go to http://www.qwconsulting.com, you are making a request to the server that hosts the QW Consulting website asking that server to deliver the website files to your computer. Depending on the files you request, the server responds with a number of different HTTP response status codes.

While you browse the internet, you make a ton of request to a number of different servers. Typically when browsing those servers return a response code of 200. The 200 status means everything is okay. In this case the server successfully received and understood the request. While you may have problems in the files returned the status 200 means the server is handling everything correctly.

The next class of error messages is the 300 series. In very simple terms, the 300 series handle redirects. The most common of these is the 301 status code which is a status code that, when returned, indicates the file requested has moved permanently to somewhere else. Think of the 301 as the online equivalent to the mail forwarding through the post office. (Learn more about 301 redirects.)

That brings us to the 400 class. The 400 series of response codes are a set of client side errors. In other words, the server and website are working fine but you requested something, for example by clicking a bad link or mistyping an address. The two more frequent response codes in this class are the 403 and the 404.

The 403 response code is a "Forbidden" request. The server knows the file is there but is refusing to respond and display that file to you. Typically this is used to prevent public access to files and to keep certain areas of a website more secure.

The 404 response code means that the file requested cannot be found typically because you have the wrong address to that page. Maybe you clicked on an old link to an old page or maybe you typed the address wrong in the address bar. (Learn more about 404 errors.)

Finally, there is the 500 class. If you see a response code in this class, there is an error with the server and for some reason the server simply cannot complete the request you have made. This could be because the server is down for maintenance, has been overloaded with too much traffic, was configured incorrectly or has encountered some other problem. Ideally you will never see this class of response code on your website but if you do this indicates you should contact the person responsible for managing the server where your website is hosted.

If you'd like to learn more about these response codes and how to prevent the 400 and 500 response class codes from occurring on your website, contact QW Consulting today.

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