[KLUG Members] Meta Tags, Key Words and Search Engines.. Oh My!

[Scott Wood]

--- "Brenda M. Williams" <bwilliams@cvalaw.com> wrote:
> Hi All,
> 
> Being fresh to the land of HTML, I was wondering if I could get some of
> you more experienced folk out there to give me the scoop on Meta Tags
> and Keywords as they relate to search engines.  I've been reading some
> varying stories, so I'd like some input from the group to help me muddle
> through this complex yet necessary topic.
>   
META is a term usually used to refer to Information about Information.  In
other words, it is stuff that doesn't necessarily produce content/output/data
but explains information about the content/output/data to follow.

> Right now this is the Meta Tag I have along with the page title... 
>  <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
> charset=iso-8859-1">

In HTML header context, the meta tag for 'http-equiv' is used to tell the web
server that in addition to any protocol information it already handles, to
include (or in your example, override) the one included in the meta tag.
HTTP is the methodology for delivering web based content (web pages, it's
associated images, script output, etc.)  In that it is a delivery mechanism, it
includes information about what is being delivered much like the invoice would
on a package.  For the most part, that exchange is a conversation between the
user-agent (browser) and the web server.
By using <meta http-equiv=""> header tags (when appropriate and for those
supported) you can tell the server to do alternate or additional things in the
hand-shaking process with the client.  The most popular example I can think of
is when people use an HTTP-EQUIV to handle a delayed redirect to another page.
(ever see one of those "This page has moved... click _here_ or wait 10 seconds
and you will be redirected" style pages?  Most of those use a META http-equiv
redirect tag)

Scott

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail
http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/