Getting listed in search engines really is important. But in the vein of
what you were talking about, people shouldn't really "worry" about it.
Note: Getting listed in directories like Yahoo is way more important than
having any search engine list you. You always receive a far more targeted
user with places like Yahoo, because they really do want to see what you
have to say.
Back on topic, the only search engines worth bothering with can handle
dynamic pages just fine. There is _no_ difference in a static html page and
a dynmically created one.
However, be _very_ careful with sessions. Sessions can force a query string
onto the end of every page on your first page, causing the spider to be
unable to visit any other page in your site!
Also be extremely careful about the use of <noframes> and browser sniffing.
So many sites do something classically stupid so that when someone sees
their site in a search engine, the description is "Your browser does not
support frames. Your browser must support frames to view this site."...I
just want to slap the webmaster every time I see that.
In short, on your index page (which is what you want bookmarked the most) do
not have links with query strings in them, do not use redirects, do not use
frames (period. if you want to use them everywhere else on the site that's
ok, but don't do it on the main page!), do not use session_start(), and do
not complain if the user has disabled javascript- if you want your site to
be well listed in search engines.
With all that taken into effect, I can see why the person you were talking
to disliked dynamic sites. But if the webmaster knows the rules of the
search engines, dynamic sites work just perfectly.
--
Plutarck
Should be working on something...
...but forgot what it was.
"Michael Kimsal" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
[EMAIL PROTECTED]">news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>
>
> Jon Shoberg wrote:
>
> > So I was having a conversation with a manager/educator in the IT
Industry :)
> >
> > In a discussion concerning search engines he stated how he dislikes
dynamic
> > web pages (PHP/ASP/JSP/CFM) because search engine spiders 'choke' on
dynamic
> > content or gives those pages a lower ranking. I can't see this as being
> > true. I epically can't see the search spider "choking" on dynamic pages
> > returning well-formed/valid HTML.
> >
> > Any thoughts?
>
> Each spider is different, and they've changed over time. Often they don't
> index a page that has a ? in it - they definitely won't be able to follow
> form input tags and such - the possibilities for input are limitless.
>
> Some can follow
> blah.com/index.php?alh=fff
>
> and links of that nature. If you've got redirects in there,tho, they'll
often
> choke on those.
>
> Apache has an advantage over IIS because you can normally
> pass in parameters in the $PATH_INFO area -
> http://www.blah.com/index.php/blag/222/dsfsd/dlkjsdf
> calls the index.php with /blag/222/dsfsd/dlkjsdf as parameters you can
grab in
> your
> script. IIS doesn't allow for this. :( (not natively anyway)
>
> Some search engines wouldn't FOLLOW a ? in a link,
> but will accept one as a 'submitted page' to index if you submit it
manually.
>
> Again, all of this information is necessarily vague. What works one year
> doesn't work the next.
>
> This was all info and experienced gleaned while building keywordcount.com
a few
> years
> ago - the whole landscape has changed, and getting 'indexed' by search
engines
> is nice,
> but imo can be a big waste of time and money given that there are many
factors
> beyond your control entirely. SEOs will bash me upside the head for that
one,
> but it's been my experiences over the past couple years. :)
>
>
>
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