20 replies to this topic

[Jill]

It seems to me that it makes sense to exclude your css directory and files from getting indexed by spiders. It's not something you want indexed and in the search engines.

So too bad for what Google says.

The funny thing is, Shari Thurow used to recommend putting your css in a separate folder and excluding it, because it is the right thing to do from a design standpoint. But at a conference, a Google rep. told her not to recommend that any more, so she took it out. That's fine, but since we don't do things for the search engines (just cuz they say so) I don't believe it's something one needs to do if they feel it's smarter to have their css not inadvertantly get indexed.

Jill

[qwerty]

They don't appear to actually index style sheets. If you do an inurl:".css" search, G will ignore the period and just give you pages about css in the SERP.

Also, on their "Facts and Fiction" page, they give a list of file types they can index:

At Google, we are able to index most types of pages and files with very few exceptions. File types we are able to index include: pdf, asp, jsp, hdml, shtml, xml, cfm, doc, xls, ppt, rtf, wks, lwp, wri.

No sign of css.

[Peter]

Hi everybody,

I would think that it is very logical that Google wants to be able to read the style sheet as it is possible to trick the search engines with it. As far as I know ( I never actually tried it my self) it is possible to make headers look like normal text. So it would be possible to make the document look different to a search engine than it looks to the visitor.

Seems to me it needs to be spidered by the search engines in order to check if there are no tricks used to get higher rankings. Also, it is logical that style sheets never show up in the SERPs.

A style sheet that is used the way it is supposed to will help getting higher rankings, since you can take out all the font tags and related things. That means a smaller file, which is prefered. Besides that, it is just more professional.

Regards,

Peter

[air-dog]

Hello all,

qwerty, .php and its variations don't seem to be on the list ether but they get indexed, but I still think your right anyway. I had a go at inurl:".css" and found that I couldn't find any .css indexed ether.

However, this search on Google showed some interesting results;

keyword filetype:css

The results show that queried .css are indexed so, in my mind, the plot thickens.

[Randy]

I'll have to respectfully disagree this time Jill. There are very good reasons in for the SE's to need to be able to see what's in an external css file. I'm by no means a css expert, but can think of at least a dozen ways to use css to fool a search engine.

In my mind, excluding your css files via a should and probably does raise a red flag for the SE's. I doubt it carries an automatic penalty at this point, but I'm betting it raises a question in their mind what you're trying to hide.

[dragonlady7]

One of the best arguments I've heard for using CSS is that it makes your pages smaller, so that the first thing the spider sees is your lovely, keyword-enhanced text.

I like hearing the .css trick for idiot thieves, too. That's pretty funny.