Below is the most important Search
Engine Terminology
Link farm
A collection of indiscriminate, often unrelated, web sites that link to each other to artificially boost link popularity.
Link popularity
Refers to the number and quality of inbound links to a web site from other web sites. One of the highest quality inbound links is a link from a major directory such as Yahoo!.
Link rot or linkrot
A link from a search engine, directory, or other web site that results in a 404 error page after a web developer modifies a web site with new URLs or removes pages from a web server.
Index M
Meta refresh
Link popularity
Refers to the number and quality of inbound links to a web site from other web sites. One of the highest quality inbound links is a link from a major directory such as Yahoo!.
Link rot or linkrot
A link from a search engine, directory, or other web site that results in a 404 error page after a web developer modifies a web site with new URLs or removes pages from a web server.
Index M
Meta refresh
Attribute in a meta tag in which one URL is replaced with another URL after a specified period of time. A method of redirecting end users from one URL to another.
Meta revisit
Attribute in a meta tag in which web designers instruct the search engine spiders to return to a web page within a specified period of time. Search engines do not honor this attribute.Meta tag
An HTML tag, placed between the HEAD tags, that gives information about the content of a web page, such as what HTML specifications a web page follows or description of a web page's content. A meta tag, however, does not affect how a web page is displayed on a browser. For online marketing, the most common uses for meta tags are the keyword, description, and robots exclusion attributes.
Mirror domains or mirror sites
Multiple copies of web sites, often on different servers, with the exact same, or similar, content. Used to artificially boost link popularity and search engine visibility.
Mirror pages
Multiple copies of web pages, often on different servers, with the exact same, or similar, content. Most mirror pages are doorway pages tailored for a specific search engine.
Index N
Navigation button
A graphic image, generally in a GIF or JPEG format, that links to a single URL
Noframes
An element commonly used on framed pages. Content placed between the NOFRAMES tags display when a browser does not support frames or is configured not to display frames. Because almost all browsers support frames, search engines either ignore or place low weight on the content inside the NOFRAMES tags.
Noscript
If a browser does not support a scripting language or if an end user has disabled client-side scripting in a browser, content between the NOSCRIPT tags is displayed. This element enables web developers to display alternative content in the event a script is not executed.
Index O
Optimisation (Optimization)
The process of designing, writing, coding (in HTML), and submitting web pages to the search engines to increase the probability that your web pages will appear at the top of search engine queries for selected keywords and key phrases. The process of making a web page as perfect or effective as possible for end users and the search engines.
Outbound link
A link from a web site to a different web site with a different domain name.
Index P
Page views
In site statistics software, the total number of times users view a single web page.
Pagerank
A numeric value that represents how popular a web page is based on Google's link analysis calculations. Part of this numeric value is the quality and quantity of links pointing to a web page.
Positioning
In a search engine or directory, the process of ordering URLs so that the most relevant sites appear at the top of search results for a particular query.
PPC
Pay-per-click (PPC) involves paying for your website to have a prominent position on the relevant search results page of a specific search engine.
Proximity search
A search in which users specify that documents returned in search results should have the words (entered into the search query) near each other
Index Q
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Index R
Ranking
In a search engine or directory, the process of ordering URLs so that the most relevant sites appear at the top of search results for a particular query.
Reciprocal links
The mutual exchange of links from one site to another.
Index N
Navigation button
A graphic image, generally in a GIF or JPEG format, that links to a single URL
Noframes
An element commonly used on framed pages. Content placed between the NOFRAMES tags display when a browser does not support frames or is configured not to display frames. Because almost all browsers support frames, search engines either ignore or place low weight on the content inside the NOFRAMES tags.
Noscript
If a browser does not support a scripting language or if an end user has disabled client-side scripting in a browser, content between the NOSCRIPT tags is displayed. This element enables web developers to display alternative content in the event a script is not executed.
Index O
Optimisation (Optimization)
The process of designing, writing, coding (in HTML), and submitting web pages to the search engines to increase the probability that your web pages will appear at the top of search engine queries for selected keywords and key phrases. The process of making a web page as perfect or effective as possible for end users and the search engines.
Outbound link
A link from a web site to a different web site with a different domain name.
Index P
Page views
In site statistics software, the total number of times users view a single web page.
Pagerank
A numeric value that represents how popular a web page is based on Google's link analysis calculations. Part of this numeric value is the quality and quantity of links pointing to a web page.
Positioning
In a search engine or directory, the process of ordering URLs so that the most relevant sites appear at the top of search results for a particular query.
PPC
Pay-per-click (PPC) involves paying for your website to have a prominent position on the relevant search results page of a specific search engine.
Proximity search
A search in which users specify that documents returned in search results should have the words (entered into the search query) near each other
Index Q
none
Index R
Ranking
In a search engine or directory, the process of ordering URLs so that the most relevant sites appear at the top of search results for a particular query.
Reciprocal links
The mutual exchange of links from one site to another.
Relative link
A link that does not include an entire domain name, subdirectory (if used), and filename together in the URL. A link that is defined by its relative position to the current URL.
Relevancy
A search engine's numeric measure of how well a particular URL matches terms entered in a search query.
Robot
A software program that search engines use that visits every URL on the web, follows all the links, and catalogs all the text of every web page that (a) contains text, and (b) that can be visited or crawled. Also known as a spider or crawler, but the term "robot" is more and more commonly associated with automated agents.
Robots Exclusion Protocol
A text file that you place on your server that instructs search engine spiders to not spider and record the information in specified areas on your web site. The same function can also be utilized using the meta-robots tag.
ROI
The total value gained after a solution has been deployed. This is usually a figurative term, like total cost of ownership, since the true cost of deployment or migration is hard to quantify. A positive return on investment is desirable, since that means the solution has solved more problems than it creates.
Index S
Search engine
Software that searches an index or database and returns relevant matches based on the information typed into a query.
Search Engine Results Page (SERP)
Abbreviation for search engine results page.
SEM
Search Engine Marketing involves a combination of free website submissions and paid search engine listings, to ensure your website reaches customers using search engines to research purchase decisions.
Semantic Web
A link that does not include an entire domain name, subdirectory (if used), and filename together in the URL. A link that is defined by its relative position to the current URL.
Relevancy
A search engine's numeric measure of how well a particular URL matches terms entered in a search query.
Robot
A software program that search engines use that visits every URL on the web, follows all the links, and catalogs all the text of every web page that (a) contains text, and (b) that can be visited or crawled. Also known as a spider or crawler, but the term "robot" is more and more commonly associated with automated agents.
Robots Exclusion Protocol
A text file that you place on your server that instructs search engine spiders to not spider and record the information in specified areas on your web site. The same function can also be utilized using the meta-robots tag.
ROI
The total value gained after a solution has been deployed. This is usually a figurative term, like total cost of ownership, since the true cost of deployment or migration is hard to quantify. A positive return on investment is desirable, since that means the solution has solved more problems than it creates.
Index S
Search engine
Software that searches an index or database and returns relevant matches based on the information typed into a query.
Search Engine Results Page (SERP)
Abbreviation for search engine results page.
SEM
Search Engine Marketing involves a combination of free website submissions and paid search engine listings, to ensure your website reaches customers using search engines to research purchase decisions.
Semantic Web
The objective of the Semantic Web Architecture is to provide a knowledge representation of linked data in order to allow machine processing on a global scale.
SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (Optimization) is the art and science of increasing your website’s visibility to search engines for those important keywords and phrases that are relevant to your business. Search Engine Optimisation refers to the process of optimising a Web site so that it appears prominently in search engine results for specific keywords. Search Engine Optimisation may involve modifying the markup of a site to make it more Search Engine Friendly, which is free, or it may involve paying search engines or directories for inclusion. Some Search Engine Optimisation techniques are frowned upon because they involve trying to 'mislead' the search engines into believing your site is more relevant to a search term than it really is.
Spam
The act of taking extreme or excessive measures to achieve top search engine positions. Spam also can be the act of using any words, HTML code, scripting, or programming on a web page that is not meant to benefit the end user experience.
Spider
Software used by a search engine to find and retrieve web pages to include in its index.
Splash page
A web page, commonly the home page, that consists either of (a) a large graphic image and a link instructing visitors to "Enter" a web site, or (b) a Flash animation, a link to skip the Flash animation (Skip Intro), and a redirect to a new page after the animation is completed.
SSI
SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (Optimization) is the art and science of increasing your website’s visibility to search engines for those important keywords and phrases that are relevant to your business. Search Engine Optimisation refers to the process of optimising a Web site so that it appears prominently in search engine results for specific keywords. Search Engine Optimisation may involve modifying the markup of a site to make it more Search Engine Friendly, which is free, or it may involve paying search engines or directories for inclusion. Some Search Engine Optimisation techniques are frowned upon because they involve trying to 'mislead' the search engines into believing your site is more relevant to a search term than it really is.
Spam
The act of taking extreme or excessive measures to achieve top search engine positions. Spam also can be the act of using any words, HTML code, scripting, or programming on a web page that is not meant to benefit the end user experience.
Spider
Software used by a search engine to find and retrieve web pages to include in its index.
Splash page
A web page, commonly the home page, that consists either of (a) a large graphic image and a link instructing visitors to "Enter" a web site, or (b) a Flash animation, a link to skip the Flash animation (Skip Intro), and a redirect to a new page after the animation is completed.
SSI
Server Side Include - a file spliced into a Web document on the Web server. May be performed by the Web server itself, or commonly by a server side script such as Perl, ASP, ColdFusion or PHP.
Static IP address
An IP address that remains constant, or the same, every time a person logs on to the Internet.
Static Typed
Static typed programming languages are those in which variables need not be defined before they're used. Static typing does not imply that you have to declare all the variables before you use them; variables maybe be initialized anywhere, but developers have to do so before they use those variables.
Stemming
Stemming is the ability for a search engine to search for variations of a word based on its root. For example, if the word "running" is typed into a search query, search engines that utilize stemming might also display documents that contain the word "run."
Stop words
Extremely common words that the search engines will not record. This is done to save space on their servers and to speed up searches. Examples of common stop words include the, a, an, for, and, but, to, and so forth. Also known as filter words.
Index T
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Index U
Unique visit
presents a single, unique viewer who has visited a web site within a specified time period.
Usability
Usability refers to the ease with which a User Interface can be used by its intended audience to achieve defined goals. Usability incorporates many factors: design, functionality, structure, information architecture, and more.
Index V
Virtual domain
A term used by web hosting services when multiple domains are hosted on a single web server. Each web site hosted on that server can have a unique domain name, called the virtual domain.
Visit
Represents one unique viewer who has visited a web site. One site visitor can view many web pages.
Index W
Web Services
"Web Services" is the umbrella term of group of loosely related Web-based resources and components that may be used by other Web applications over HTTP. Those resources could include anything from phone directory data to weather data to sports results.
Web site
A collection of web pages, usually found under one domain, generally formatted in HTML, that contain text, graphic images, and multimedia effects such as sound files, video and/or animation files, and other programming or scripting elements such as Java and JavaScript.
Index X
XHTML
XHTML combines XML and HTML 4 to provide developers with a language that conforms to the XML format, as opposed to HTML which is based on SGML. XML is much simpler to parse than SGML, and standards exist such as XSLT, XPath, and XQuery for manipulating XML documents. Unfortunately, support for XHTML in browsers is poor, with the leading browser, Microsoft Internet Explorer, not supporting the XHTML mime type 'application/xhtml+xml'.
XML
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is an extremely simple dialect of SGML. The goal is to enable generic SGML to be served, received, and processed on the Web in the way that is now possible with HTML. XML [XML] has been designed for ease of implementation and for interoperability with both SGML and HTML.
XSL
Extensible Stylesheet Language, or XSL, is a language that describes how XML content is to be formatted.
XUL
Static IP address
An IP address that remains constant, or the same, every time a person logs on to the Internet.
Static Typed
Static typed programming languages are those in which variables need not be defined before they're used. Static typing does not imply that you have to declare all the variables before you use them; variables maybe be initialized anywhere, but developers have to do so before they use those variables.
Stemming
Stemming is the ability for a search engine to search for variations of a word based on its root. For example, if the word "running" is typed into a search query, search engines that utilize stemming might also display documents that contain the word "run."
Stop words
Extremely common words that the search engines will not record. This is done to save space on their servers and to speed up searches. Examples of common stop words include the, a, an, for, and, but, to, and so forth. Also known as filter words.
Index T
none
Index U
Unique visit
presents a single, unique viewer who has visited a web site within a specified time period.
Usability
Usability refers to the ease with which a User Interface can be used by its intended audience to achieve defined goals. Usability incorporates many factors: design, functionality, structure, information architecture, and more.
Index V
Virtual domain
A term used by web hosting services when multiple domains are hosted on a single web server. Each web site hosted on that server can have a unique domain name, called the virtual domain.
Visit
Represents one unique viewer who has visited a web site. One site visitor can view many web pages.
Index W
Web Services
"Web Services" is the umbrella term of group of loosely related Web-based resources and components that may be used by other Web applications over HTTP. Those resources could include anything from phone directory data to weather data to sports results.
Web site
A collection of web pages, usually found under one domain, generally formatted in HTML, that contain text, graphic images, and multimedia effects such as sound files, video and/or animation files, and other programming or scripting elements such as Java and JavaScript.
Index X
XHTML
XHTML combines XML and HTML 4 to provide developers with a language that conforms to the XML format, as opposed to HTML which is based on SGML. XML is much simpler to parse than SGML, and standards exist such as XSLT, XPath, and XQuery for manipulating XML documents. Unfortunately, support for XHTML in browsers is poor, with the leading browser, Microsoft Internet Explorer, not supporting the XHTML mime type 'application/xhtml+xml'.
XML
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is an extremely simple dialect of SGML. The goal is to enable generic SGML to be served, received, and processed on the Web in the way that is now possible with HTML. XML [XML] has been designed for ease of implementation and for interoperability with both SGML and HTML.
XSL
Extensible Stylesheet Language, or XSL, is a language that describes how XML content is to be formatted.
XUL
XUL( eXtensible User Interface Language; also 'XML-based User-Interface Language'), pronounced "Zool", is a standards-based language developed as a framework for executing applications within the Mozilla browser, just as you might run programs in the Java and .NET runtime environments.
