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Googlebot and some other search engine crawlers also crawl css stylesheet files, I have seen evidence in my server log files. There are several patents describ

Googlebot and some other search engine crawlers also crawl css stylesheet files, I have seen evidence in my server log files. There are several patents describing how a search engine might analyse the visual appearance and structure of a website, with a special view to give some parts of the page content (the main content) a higher weight or priority then the rest (like footer text and navigation). I would expect that the algorithms used by Google will give a good impression about the page rendering. What conclusions are drawn from this and how it affects the ranking of individual pages for certain search queries, who knows, ... pretty much about this is kept secret and there is a lot of speculation. Many search engine patents are explored and explained by Bill Slawski on his blog "SEO by the sea": http://www.seobythesea.com/ http://www.seobythesea.com/ That there are these patents does of course not tell us, that search engines are working exactly in this or another way, but I think it often gives a good impression about what might be going on behind the scenes.

blauwbilgorgel 15y ago
Further reading: Techniques for approximating the visual layout of a web page and determining the portion of the page containing the significant content http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&p=1&S1=20060149775&OS=20060149775&RS=20060149775 http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Se... Automatic Visual Segmentation Of Webpages http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&S1=20090177959.PGNR.&OS=dn/20090177959&RS=DN/20090177959 http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sec... Techniques for approximating the visual layout of a web page and determining the portion of the page containing the significant content http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&S1=20080033996.PGNR.&OS=dn/20080033996&RS=DN/20080033996 http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Se.... VIPS: a Vision-based Page Segmentation Algorithm http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=70027 http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=7002... Classifying functions of web blocks based on linguistic features http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PTXT&S1=7,895,148.PN.&OS=PN/7,895,148&RS=PN/7,895,148 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sec... How a Search Engine Might Identify the Functions of Blocks in Web Pages to Improve Search Results http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/02/how-a-search-engine-might-identify-the-functions-of-blocks-in-web-pages-to-improve-search-results/ http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/02/how-a-search-engine-might...

blauwbilgorgel 15y ago

Further reading: Techniques for approximating the visual layout of a web page and determining the portion of the page containing the significant content http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&p=1&S1=20060149775&OS=20060149775&RS=20060149775 http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Se... Automatic Visual Segmentation Of Webpages http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&S1=20090177959.PGNR.&OS=dn/20090177959&RS=DN/20090177959 http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sec... Techniques for approximating the visual layout of a web page and determining the portion of the page containing the significant content http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&S1=20080033996.PGNR.&OS=dn/20080033996&RS=DN/20080033996 http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Se.... VIPS: a Vision-based Page Segmentation Algorithm http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=70027 http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=7002... Classifying functions of web blocks based on linguistic features http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=1&p=1&f=G&l=50&d=PTXT&S1=7,895,148.PN.&OS=PN/7,895,148&RS=PN/7,895,148 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sec... How a Search Engine Might Identify the Functions of Blocks in Web Pages to Improve Search Results http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/02/how-a-search-engine-might-identify-the-functions-of-blocks-in-web-pages-to-improve-search-results/ http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/02/how-a-search-engine-might...