FP: Using the META Element with Web Spiders, Robots

• Microsoft FrontPage 98 for Windows
• Microsoft FrontPage 97 for Windows with Bonus Pack
• Microsoft FrontPage for the Power Macintosh, version 1.0

SUMMARY

Web Spiders or Robots are a great resource for people searching the Internet, but they present a problem to Web page designers who want their pages to be seen and properly indexed. One popular solution to this behavior is to use the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) META element.

MORE INFORMATION

The META element is used within the HEAD element to embed document meta- information that is not defined by other HEAD elements. This embedded information can be extracted by servers and clients to identify, index, and catalog specialized document meta-information. A META element can be written in one of two forms: META NAME and META HTTP-EQUIV. The NAME attribute is returned in the HEAD of the document, while the HTTP-EQUIV attribute is converted into the HTTP response header which is parsed by the Web server.

If you plan to use a Robot, you should use the META NAME form as shown in these examples:

   <META NAME="author" CONTENT="John Doe">
   <META NAME="date" CONTENT="12/31/97">

A META element standard for Robots has evolved which consists of two parts:

   Description    A brief description of the Web page.

   Keywords       One or more words that refer to the content that can be
                  found on the page.

   Example 1
   ---------

      <META NAME="description" CONTENT="Web Spider Information">
      <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="robots, spiders">

   Example 2
   ---------

      <META NAME="description" CONTENT="The Jogging Page">
      <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="jogging, health, fitness">

To add a META tag like the ones shown in the examples to your Web page, follow these steps:

1. Open your page in Front Page Editor.

2. On the File menu, click Page Properties.

3. Click the Custom tab.

4. In the User Variables section, click Add.

5. In the Name box, type the meta name.

6. In the Value box, type the meta content.

7. Click OK

8. Click OK again.

9. Save the page to your Web.