Forum Moderators: open
TJ
It seems that our sites have their google directory cat description and cat names in search results, although the sites are not actually listed in the cats themselves.
Is this usually a two-stage process?
Anyone know what's going on?
TJ
TJ
Some minor changes were made to the way it was produced in order to make it more robust and to eliminate certain types of bad data finding the way into the file. Google is using a copy that is at least 3 or 4 months old.
Google is using a copy that is at least 3 or 4 months old.
Strange thing is I have a site that made it into DMOZ in April and have never seen a category listing in the SERPs, but there are multiple mentions of newer sites showing their category listings now.
My current understanding is that Google simply spiders dmoz.org.
Now, the RDF has been created fairly recently (within 3 weeks). As has been mentioned, the RDF is the Product of the Open Directory Project -- the official deliverable directory. Dmoz.org is just a somewhat-out-of-date snapshot of the database from which the RDF is built.
Lately, dmoz.org has been spotty-out-of-date -- that is, most categories several weeks out of date (rather than the usual several minutes), but some actually almost current.
So that's what you will see--Google search, dmoz.org, and google directory contain three different partial time-lapse snapshots of the Open Directory database over the last couple of months. Only the Google directory can be considered to be "all from the same date" -- both of the other sources contain a random assortment of old and new pages.
This will be fixed by the time the dmoz.org hardware update is complete (well, actually, the hardware upgrade won't be considered complete until this is fixed.)
Progress has been made on the upgrade. New search servers are up and running. The new gerbils are thoroughbred racers, and editors are editing on a scale perhaps not ever seen before. Some stuff still isn't working (there is a new, more flexible, more powerful synchronization scheme for public page updates; editor applications are being required to correspond with blackhole@lost.server.dmoz.org; editor forums aren't really usable; bits of the dmoz.org search aren't working right.)
That means, I suppose, that the upgrade isn't finished.
Editor applications are being required to correspond with blackhole@lost.server.dmoz.org; editor forums aren't really usable; bits of the dmoz.org search aren't working right.
Sounds like a normal day to me :).
Actualy the editor forums are working almost fine now - they've been down for a week due to an upgrade but are now up and running again. More information in the ODP Weblog (do a google search, should be first result).
add: thank you DMOZ & Google for the free stuff!
