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JGIRL
05-06-2003, 00:54/12:54AM
Ok, I hope this is the right area to ask this. If not I apologize in advance.
For one This is what I have for my meta tags. I changed them but is each meta tag supposed to have one keyword in the each or does it matter.

I also noted that it has the description content, I am assuming that is supposed to be the title tag?
is there a better way to set this up or shall I just make each meta tag with one key word? I did have more involved in this, but I cut it way, way, down. Any suggestions. I think I am getting the hang of how to make these meta tag things though :-)).

I just didn't know the rules for when it came to meta tags. I really didn't see anything about rules or the guidelines on making them.

Thanks!

should it say <meta=name="one keyword">
and go down like that or is it ok to shove everything together in one HTML like I did. I made it as one as a clarification and the other content. I don't know if that matters or not as well.


<META name="keywords" content="American Girl Dolls,Handmade Soaps,Handmade Crafts,Gifts,craft ideas,Fine Art">
<META name="classification" content="American Girl Dolls,Handmade Soaps,Handmade Crafts,Gifts,craft ideas,Fine Art"><!--American Girl Dolls,Handmade Soaps,Handmade Crafts,Gifts,craft ideas,Fine Art--><!--American Girl Dolls,Handmade Soaps,Handmade Crafts,Gifts,craft ideas,Fine Art-->
french dread
05-06-2003, 03:23/03:23AM
Hi july,

Use the meta datas as they are intended for:

<Title> for title
<META name="description" for a description of the page (real phrase but keyword rich)
<META name="keywords" for keywords (Dont put to much of them 1 line is enough)

<META name="classification" is not useful afaik
g1smd
05-06-2003, 14:30/02:30PM
Cut out the <!-- keyword lists inside comment tags --> as these serve no purpose at all.



Make sure you add a Content-type declaration which says which character encoding the page uses, and add a Content-Language declaration ready for the time that robots take notice of the language used on the page.




I usually put a minimum of this on every page:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<title> Your Title Here </title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="EN-GB">
<meta name="Description" content=" Your Description Here. ">
<meta name="Keywords" content=" your, keyword, list, here ">
<meta name="MSSmartTagsPreventParsing" content="TRUE">
<meta http-equiv="imagetoolbar" content="no">
</head>

<body>


You can, and should, also optimise the title and description (and keywords) for each page individually to attract search engines.


The title should be a normal language approriate title for what that page is actually about. The description should also be a normal language description of that page. Keep it short, use keywords, but don't do them as a list. the keywords tag isn't widely used, but that should be done as a list of words. Commas are optional, but don't keep on repeating words. If it starts to look like spam, then it is spam.


Any <style> or <script> information within the <head> section, should always be after all of the meta tags.



External files should be used for <style> and <script> information where possible. These are called by:

<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" name="commonstyle" src="/path/file.css">

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript" src="/path/file.js"></script>

All <style> information must be with the <head> section.

However, a <script> can be either within the <head> or <body> section.




I also use robots tags on some pages that I do not want to be indexed:

<meta name="robots" content="noindex,follow">




It never used to matter if HTML tags used upper or lower case. In HTML 4.01 it is recommended to write all tags and attributes in lower case. For XHTML and XML it then becomes a requirement.
JGIRL
06-06-2003, 10:30/10:30AM
Great thanks so much for the advice!

I was wondering if that was too much.I will take that and play with it.

It is that spam thing that I was wondering about.
g1smd
06-06-2003, 15:31/03:31PM
No problem.

There are several other posts in ths forum with yet more related information.
JGIRL
07-06-2003, 09:27/09:27AM
That is what I am reading about now :-))

Im a reading again, until another questions pops up, there are just too many good threads about that spam stuff :-))
vinyl-junkie
07-06-2003, 10:31/10:31AM
I'm curious about anyone else's opinion of meta tag generators. I found a really cool one at WebFX.jwdx.com when I first put them on my site (that site appeared to be down just now when I checked). Anyway, I really liked it because not only did it generate the code for me, it had a pretty good explanation of the different tags, what they mean, length restrictions, etc. There are plenty of other meta tag generators online besides the one I used. Anyay, what do you think about them?
ihelpyou
07-06-2003, 10:32/10:32AM
Most of those generators are wrong when they talk about 'length' etc.
vinyl-junkie
07-06-2003, 10:35/10:35AM
Originally posted by ihelpyou
Most of those generators are wrong when they talk about 'length' etc. Forgive my ignorance, but why? I know that when I search Google, for example, there are only so many characters it displays when it gives a page's description. Is that 'length' what would display if the search engine used the meta-description? I'm just curious.
JGIRL
10-06-2003, 00:35/12:35AM
You know I saw those things too with keywords and such, I think that would be sooo much easier than tpying every <>===><>?!!! yhings and words.

But oh well. I guess if that was the case Doug and everyone else would be extremly rich haaaaaa

HINT HINT!!
Hope
10-06-2003, 07:24/07:24AM
Originally posted by vinyl-junkie
Forgive my ignorance, but why? I know that when I search Google, for example, there are only so many characters it displays when it gives a page's description. Is that 'length' what would display if the search engine used the meta-description? I'm just curious.

Because the information is usual very old. Search engines change their preferences on length and effectiveness all the time. If the person who runs t he generator doesn't keep up and keep changeing the information, then it is not correct.

The length is what is shown in the search engines, but it really doesn't make a different. The length shouldn't be a concern. Use one or two short sentences that are keyword rich and you will do fine.

It doesn't take long to make meta tags yourself. As a matter of fact, it only takes about a minute.

<meta name="description" content="add description here">
<meta name="keywords" content="add keywords here">
<meta name="robots" content="all">

That is all you need. Don't forget you also need a really good title, but that isn't a meta tag.
JGIRL
10-06-2003, 08:58/08:58AM
Heck if it did that, let me know where to sign up :-))
that looks like easier tags than what I am making LOL
g1smd
10-06-2003, 14:29/02:29PM
>> <meta name="description" content="add description here">
>> <meta name="keywords" content="add keywords here">
>> <meta name="robots" content="all">

>> That is all you need. <<


Umm. Not Quite! Before those, you will also need:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<title> Your Title Here </title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
JGIRL
10-06-2003, 14:43/02:43PM
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">

I am being stupid now,

What does that exactly does that mean? I understand its html and that is it. I know its a documentation type.

thanks
guerrilla
10-06-2003, 15:57/03:57PM
Ok, there seems to be a fair amount of activity about tags, but with Inktomi being the only one that looks, and their reach is continuing to decrease, are they worth the time and effort?

Wow, what a run on sentance. I guess I won't be a copywriter.

I think that the only important one is title and make it short and descriptive.
g1smd
10-06-2003, 17:43/05:43PM
>> What does that exactly does that mean? <<

It says that you are using HTML version 4.01 markup codes in your page, not HTML 2.0 or HTML 3.2 or XHTML 1.0 or some other version.

That code is there simply to tell the browser what to expect in the document, rather than it having to try to work it out. The code validator also needs this line of informtion, so that it too can know what standard to check the code against.


>> I think that the only important one is title and make it short and descriptive. <<

At risk of repeating myself, here, I think.

You need a DOCTYPE, and a page <title>. You need to declare what character set the page is using, and what human language the content is written in. You'll need a meta description and adding keywords is also a good idea. The date and author information can help a site owner maintain content more effectively. You'll need a meta robots tag on pages that you do not want to be indexed.

See the above posts.
JGIRL
11-06-2003, 14:02/02:02PM
OK that makes sence Thanks so much!
But one thing, how do you know what version of html you are using. Or is that from the programs that you use.
g1smd
11-06-2003, 14:52/02:52PM
If you look at http://w3.org/ you will find there the formal definitions for each version of HTML. These will list the tags that are valid for that version, what attributes can go with them, and what attribute values are defined. In short it is you that decides what version of HTML that you are going to use. You write the code, then use the code validator to give you a list of typos, errors, nesting errors, missing information, wrong values and so on, and then you correct the code to suit.

For most people, the meta tag above, for HTML 4.01 Transitional is more than likely going to be the most appropriate, unless you are attempting to do some bleeding edge coding.

Don't get bogged down by all the specifications and lists at w3.org as they are worded such that you have to know quite a lot before you can really begin to understand what they are talking about.
JGIRL
12-06-2003, 09:15/09:15AM
Great that was awesome and I learned alot there!
I have the html 4 as well, so I guess I don't have to worry about it :-))


From DW that doc type automatically puts it in for you, which was a huge help! I thought I understood html, but I guess there's new things that pop up every day :-))