Stopping people from viewing page source.

Can it be done? how?

[Dino_M]

I want to stop users from viewing the source of my site can this be done and if so how?

[Chris_R]

Not really - there are encryption things yo can get that will do it, but then the search engines can't read them.

[hurlimann]

Yes, at least all they will be able to copy is garbage like:

;y%=tnW;mtn;mVJ0m;GU=#x=VGH0?G;U=..=VL9-0?vU=;y%=tnW;mtn;mVJ0m;GU=a:=VGH0?G;U=..=VL9-0?vU=;y%

Of course the problem is that is what the Search Engines see as well!

[txbakers]

Why do you want viewers not to see your source? Are you embarassed by it?

The browser needs to download the source to the client machine in order to render it. You can't help that. Same with images. They are stored in the local machine's cache.

Unless you want to make you entire site in Flash, the code must be visible.

[Liane]

Cloak, its the only way around it. But what is in your source that you don't want others to see?

[Dino_M]

Nothing in the source.. yet

was considering placeing some text behind a flash page and did'nt want to get spam reported. Looks like I will just have to place it below the flash. My designers will not be that impressed, but hey better than a PR0

[Mark_A]

An amusing trick I noticed someone doing was simply whitespace at the top of each document code.

Enough space so that page code only started more than 800px down the page in most text viewers i.e. below the first visible page.

Had me figuring for quite a while that one :-)

[Dino_M]

nice simple trick, often work the best!

So if I come up with a super optimised site, my competitor can just copy all the source and be ranked up right along with me in the next update.

That seems a bit much

[ukgimp]

The source is only part of it though Dino. If you have the on topic links and all of that sort of thing you should still stay ahead.

[Chris_R]

That worked in the old days - it doesn't anymore. What is on the page just isn't that iomportant compared to everything else.

I am not saying I am against using tricks - just those that don't work.

This type of stuff just doesn't work out well.

[Dino_M]

that's true enough.#

Anyone used somethig called robotwatch.cgi think this can hide your source and even show a different source all together

[scrubtheweb.com ]

feedback on the above would be much appreciated.

[Chris_R]

You have a much greater chance getting turned in for using that than anything else.

Look at it this way - look at the MOST competitive areas on the web - and the people ranked there - are they cloaking their source?

Not usually.

You don't need this stuff.

[vitaplease]

So if I come up with a super optimised site..

Most optimisation would be visible, I would say.
Most important optimisation is off-page IMO.

I do not mind people using part of my content.

What I would like, is a script: on right-mouse click, copy - then paste,

an automatic add-on of the url of that page with source: in front of it, when the paste occurs ;)

Also: [webmasterworld.com...]