new? &meta= appended to search strings

[cchooper]

I checked out some logs today grepping for google and noticed a few entries like this (same user, using google.ca)

66.185.85.80 - - [17/Mar/2003:18:29:22 -0500] "GET /index.php HTTP/1.1" 200 1786 http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=search+string+here&btnG=Google+Search&meta=" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)"

Is there a new version of the Google toolbar out? What's the meta variable for? Is it new?

[Brett_Tabke]

I just double checked and they were everywhere. All of the meta values were blank.

Nice catch. Not sure what it is for.

[cchooper]

I'm wondering ... is Google going to start letting its searchers restrict their search the meta keywords as well as what's already in place? is it even function yet? i'm gonna mess around with it a little bit tonight and see if i find anything.

*edit*
I guess it isn't anything yet? if I do something like

[google.com...] I get a 404 not found, still trying though ... still trying

i've noticed so far that it's not on google.com (at least not in my logs) but shows up from google.ca, google.co.uk, google.com.ar, and a few others

[edited by: cchooper at 8:54 pm (utc) on Mar. 18, 2003]

[Receptional Andy]

This has been around for a while. It's where Google puts the variable that controls country indexes AFAIK. As in

&meta=cr%3DcountryUK%7CcountryGB

for www.google.co.uk

I know this because adding the string to www3.google.com searches gives you the results that will appear on the .co.uk searches during the dance.

[cchooper]

Oh, thanks, I just thought it was weird that they were all blank in my logs, and hadn't seen them before =]