Quail

Checking Google adwords?

[rjohara]

I don't know much about identifying spiders, checking user agents, etc., but I just got an interesting hit from 216.239.45.4, which is a Google.com address. It came to a page I just linked to a new AdWords Select ad, and the referrer was listed as [quail:8180...]

Obviously that's not a complete address (I don't know a whole lot about decoding referral logs either), but I wondered if this might be an automated check on the AdWords links. The AdWords TOS specifies several things such as no popups, content relevant to keyword, etc. Perhaps this is how it is being checked. (Or perhaps it is something entirely different.) "Select" would seem to be a clue. Not sure about "quail" - maybe just an allusion to Callipepla [nhptv.org]. :)

RJO

[volatilegx]

I'd say quail is probably the machine name that generated the list that some human clicked on to verify that you're obeying the terms of service. It's probably only accessable from within the Google LAN/WAN.