SSI etiquitte

Forum Moderators: coopster & phranque

Message Too Old, No Replies

SSI etiquitte

Include all tags?

mdharrold

2:17 am on Aug 4, 2001 (gmt 0)

When building a menu or header page to be used as an SSI, should you include the <html>, <meta>, <head>, or <body> tags or just start with the code?

Do the browsers care?
Do the spiders care?

Brett_Tabke

11:43 am on Aug 4, 2001 (gmt 0)

Say this is your file that includes your remote control navigation menu code:

Apache just INSERTS the contents of "remote.htm" into the output stream. So...the head section an all tags have already be sent by the first file. SSI includes are just simple "inserts". You can mix and match files at will with any content. What you see in the browser, is just what the server sent.

For example over on search engine world, each page has 6 ssi includes.

1- default header info is built

- meta tags inserted here

2- custom title tags

- /head closed and /body opened in 2

3- advertising code insert

- bulk of page content output from whatever file we are parsing here.

4- a counter is called

(often I run two counters, one at top and one at bottom of page to watch for reloads as a sign of server problems.)

5- right side navigation menu is printed

6- finaly, the bottom is printed with copyright..etc, and the html closed out.

(filenames changed out of self protection)

mdharrold

8:47 pm on Aug 5, 2001 (gmt 0)

Brett-
You have'nt seen any problems with the spiders reading this?

Do the spiders care if every SSI page has its own meta and head tags?

grnidone

2:31 am on Aug 6, 2001 (gmt 0)

The spiders do not have a problem reading this. The include is done before the spider gets the page, so you are golden.

The "included" file has only what is needed. If you put meta and head tags on the "included" file, then it might be out of place on the "includer file.

Does that make sense?
-G

mdharrold

12:10 am on Aug 7, 2001 (gmt 0)

I completely understand. That is why I asked. I have been using SSI for a few months and noticed that all included pages had meta and head tags and started to wonder if this was causing any problems for the spiders.

Thanks

mivox

12:28 am on Aug 7, 2001 (gmt 0)

Don't think of it as an "included page," think of it as an included code snippet...

If you want to include a navigation table, all the SSI source page needs to have is the actual nav table code (from <table> to </table> ). The SSI source page can be a .txt file if you like, or an .html file, etc.

When setting up the SSI includes, ask yourself, "What code would I have to cut & paste to insert this page element directly into my main .html page?" That's exactly the same code you need to have in your SSI source file...

Brett_Tabke

10:37 pm on Aug 21, 2001 (gmt 0)

What you see in the browser for source code when you view a page, is just what a spider is going to see. It doesn't matter if there is one or one hundred includes.

Double meta's and head sections isn't something you want on any page. Some se's will have a problem with that part.

SSI etiquitte

Include all tags?

mdharrold

Brett_Tabke

mdharrold

grnidone

mdharrold

mivox

Brett_Tabke

Join The Conversation

Moderators and Top Contributors

Hot Threads This Week