7 replies to this topic

[roncastle]

Greetings and thanks, Jill for the new forum.

Google is making me Goofy and the problem is with the Beta 2.0 "cached snapshot of page" feature.

I am presently working on 6 new webs. For one of them, half the time the Google Goofy bar tells me the index page of a new web is cached, half the time it doesn't and there is no rhyme or reason when or why.

The cached page I see was cached on July 23, yet the web is nowhere to be found 200 rankings deep using 5 top notch first page word phrases, including the company name.

Anyone else seeing this? Any ideas. The problem has been reported to the Googlebar team who are all probably down at the bar.

Thanks. Cheers.

[Matt B]

Well, Ron, I'm not really sure how to answer your questions unless I have a clearer understanding what you are trying to accomplish.

(Sorry, I think maybe it's a combination of an early start on the evening ( ) and your problem seems to be fairly involved)

How new are these sites that you are working on? Are they framed sites? Are you looking for the cache as an indicator of how soon your pages are getting into Google? I'm not really sure of how you want to cache feature to work.

[roncastle]

Thanks for your quick reply.

The webs are html, no frames. Nothing tricky.

Yes, I am using the page cache as an indicator that the web has been Googlebotted.

[Matt B]

OK - you're much better off watching your logs for that kind of info. The cache is not reliable as that kind of tool. Googlebot tends to visit sites much more often that a cache date will provide. Also, a cache date does not indicate when a new page was added to the index.

[Jill]

Welcome roncastle!

I think you're confusing the Google toolbar and Google's cache. Your toolbar is just one means of clicking to the cached page of your site.

Currently, Google has many different databases, some of which are more up-to-date than others. So what you're probably seeing is simply the results in the various databases. Sometimes you see a database that has a newer version of your page, and sometimes not. This has nothing to do with the Google Toolbar.



Jill

[dragonlady7]

I don't think the Googlebar was designed with the convenience of webmasters in mind, though if you ask the folks at WebMasterWorld it was designed solely to their specifications.
However, as recent issues with it have made clear, it's not a reliable indicator of much-- the PageRank indicator, for example, is often entirely wrong-- and therefore can't really be used as a tool.
I guess they really only mean for it to be used in searching Google, and it seems to work best for those who don't really understand Google. :/
Maybe things will improve, or maybe they're thinking that some of its functions might lead to abuse and so they're going to phase them out. It's impossible to say at this juncture. The advice of those above to consult your logs is probably the best course of action.

[Matt B]

Hey Jill, the beta toolbar has a cache funtion in it as one of the options, so you can see the cache of the page you are visiting, rather than going thru the SERP's. I think that's what Ron's using as a reference.

[twhittle]

Hey Ron,

You could also use this to check for you:

http://googledance.seochat.com/

It's pretty useful as it checks the servers for you in one shot. Try it out.

Jill, nice looking forums! Great job to you and your crew!

Todd Whittle
e.magination network, llc.
:tooth: