Will a search engine follow buttons?

referring to onclick

[twist]

Here is my code,

<input type="button" value="Agree" onclick="location.href=\'pagename/'. $ip .'\'" />

I have a area on my website where visitors can post pictures, music files and so on. I have a TOS that I would like all visitors to read before viewing the user files. It basically tells people to report any copyrighted material that may not belong to the poster and explains how the content isn't copyrighted by the website but the submitter.

I don't want to use cookies so I grab the users ip address and just pass it to every page where I test it against the current ip. If no match it sends the user back to the agreement page. It's also a simple way to keep people from directly linking to their content.

My worry is that search engines might not be able to follow the button link. My other worry is that even if I switch it to a text link the grabbing and checking of the ip will somehow screw up the search bots.

Any thoughts?

[edited by: pageoneresults at 11:55 pm (utc) on Feb. 8, 2004]
[edit reason] Fixed HTML [/edit]

[jweighell]

No, I don't believe that search engines will pay any attention to it since it's javascript.

[fabfurs]

You should also be aware that the IP address isn't a good identifier if your users are using AOL or some kind of proxy service.

A user can have a different IP for each page element they request so in your scenario they would redirected back to the registration page continuously.

[KeywordROI]

I see an example where a link on a forum says: domain.com and links to the forum for that topic. Nowhere on those forums, do I find a link to my domain.com yet google counts on that link as a reverse link.

Bots are getting smarter as much as they can with the Human Intelligence. I feel JavaScript links, though not good for SEO reasons, are followed.

[twist]

I got of the ip checking and buttons. I'll just slap a disclaimer at the top of any pages with downloads.

Thanks for the help everybody.