Collapsed View for Guests & Webcrawlers

[col]

Hi all. It has been a while. I hope everyone is keeping well.

I found that all categories for forums/boards were collapsed before I logged in. Yes, clicking a category opens the list of forums/boards, but this might not be obvious to all guests.

It also means that webcrawlers need to go through an extra step, so that content is an extra click away - this might affect SEO.

[stevewf]

Yes. When I go to guitarnuts2.proboards.com/ using other than my customary browser, I get this:

 which has all the main headings collapsed.

When I expand one heading and quit that browser, and then reopen the browser and return to the GN2 page, then that one heading remains expanded. Then I manually collapse the harding, quit, reopen and all the headings are again collapsed.

There's some sort of memory regarding the state of collapse

[newey]

The open versus closed sub-board headings are saved as cookies. If you don't have cookies enabled, then they aren't saved. This is stated in the header.

As for webcrawlers, I don't know about that, or whether we should have a concern or not.

[sumgai]

Web crawling depends on who's doing the crawl operation. Some, such as Google, go as deep as they can find (valid) links, others perhaps not so deep.

I'm not concerned, as we have a not-indecent percentage of visitors brought to us by a search engine, looking for something specific, and the engine sent them here. From that I deduce that the engine was able to traipse down through top-level page and divine whatever was here that the requester was looking for. And sent them straight to that page, not to just the top level.

In fact, most sites that are essentially bulletin boards like ours do indeed have a 'full' top-level entry page that is fully expanded compared to ours. But I know people who are easily confused by such 'busy' pages, they prefer a more simple layout that they don't feel 'rushed' to absorb a bunch of stuff they don't necessarily want to bother with. For those kinds of folks, our home page is well-suited.

IOW, damned if we do, and damned if we don't - Hobb's Choice and all that.

HTHe



sumgai


p.s. Hey col, long time no hear from! How's your end of the world holding up?

[reTrEaD]

Nov 24, 2023 16:19:10 GMT -5 col said:

It also means that webcrawlers need to go through an extra step, so that content is an extra click away - this might affect SEO.

Probably not. AFAIK, webcrawlers don't 'see' a web page the way a human views it on the screen as presented by the browser. Instead, they see the entire page source. Although containers that are styled with "display: none;" or otherwise hidden by the browser don't appear when we view them, the contents are still in the page source. Text, links, all of it. So there isn't an 'extra click' required by the crawler to 'see' them. I reckon this will have absolutely effect on SEO.

"I could be wrong now, but I don't think so ..."

[stevewf]

Nov 26, 2023 7:56:01 GMT -5 newey said:

The open versus closed sub-board headings are saved as cookies. If you don't have cookies enabled, then they aren't saved. This is stated in the header.

...and even appears in my screenshot! Doopsie me again!

Nov 26, 2023 20:29:15 GMT -5 reTrEaD said:

...the contents are still in the page source. 

Used my browser's 'developer tools' and confirm that the HTML contains text that is contained in collapsed sections. Using the tools, I searched for "Lutherie", which, at the moment, was not visible on my screen. It found multiple hits. Presumably, a web crawler should have access to it, even though I don't see it in my normal browser window.

[col]

Nov 26, 2023 12:09:02 GMT -5 sumgai said:

p.s. Hey col, long time no hear from! How's your end of the world holding up?

Hi sumgai and all. Yeah, it has been a while.

I'm good. Well, OK at least! And how are you keeping?

I see that America is still bonkers. I was back home for a while - the UK is still bonkers too. I've tried out France and now Belgium - and what do you know, it seems everywhere is bonkers. That, or it is me.

[col]

Nov 26, 2023 20:29:15 GMT -5 reTrEaD said:

Nov 24, 2023 16:19:10 GMT -5 col said:

It also means that webcrawlers need to go through an extra step, so that content is an extra click away - this might affect SEO.

Probably not. AFAIK, webcrawlers don't 'see' a web page the way a human views it on the screen as presented by the browser. Instead, they see the entire page source. Although containers that are styled with "display: none;" or otherwise hidden by the browser don't appear when we view them, the contents are still in the page source. Text, links, all of it. So there isn't an 'extra click' required by the crawler to 'see' them. I reckon this will have absolutely effect on SEO.

"I could be wrong now, but I don't think so ..."

Hi reTrEaD.

Your reasoning makes sense. But Google in particular rates sites based both on content and usability. I'm unsure, but Google might ding SEO scores for extra clicks taken to reach content.

www.searchenginejournal.com/google-click-depth-matters-seo-url-structure/256779/#close

I think it is the number of clicks for a user to reach the content that's important, rather than from the web crawler's perspective (which is, as you rightly point out, unaffected).

Neither is this about accordion content - at least I don't think so. It does not appear to be relevant the situation here as the accordion pushes the important content one click further away from the community home page. But thinking about this some more, although at first glance the accordion content might seem to be of low value, it tends to be keyword-rich links to different forums/boards. So maybe the accordion forum list is not good for indexing of individuals forums/boards either.

www.seoexamples.com/p/hidden-content-in-seo-unmasking-the

www.fireandspark.com/seo-faqs/do-accordions-affect-seo/

I am not sure if any of those links fully answer the question. I'll try to look into this more tomorrow.

[newey]

At one point in our (i.e., the admins) ongoing battle with the spammers, we had either theorized, or perhaps been informed somehow, that spammers were inserting a signature into their profile with their spam website link, on the idea that the search engines would "drill down" even into the footers containing their signature. they'd generate some free hits, the thinking went.

I don't have the tech saavy to know the details of search optimization, but if it can drill down into the footer, or perhaps into the user profiles, then getting beyond the collapsed view would seem to be a piece of cake. Just my 2¢.

[bassplayerordinaire]

1.  The bolts behind my inspiration to post something in a 6 string forum while I am a 4 stringer through and through has to do specifically with where this thread headed and you did say "nuts" in your board title.

2.  This thread was discovered via a Google search for "free bulletin board software."

3.  It took me multiple clicks via the ProBoards website I was exploring for someone else, thus my visitorship represents two things:  A.) I clearly can be easily, and happily, distracted by music related matters and B.) My entry into your domain was NOT via Google, thus giving my time here a different score to all those who have access to that stuff when deciding the Final Temporary Score your board is given by any search engine, including Google and using who knows what kinds of data/math in whatever way their formula calls for.

4.  Thank you all for even considering for a moment what kind of impact 8 billion people on one planet can have when it comes to the automated side of our reality.

5.  What motivated me to open an account and post was the questions surrounding the impact of a collapsed view vs. open view of content.  First, as it relates to the concept of an algorithm visiting the site for purpose of extracting some portion of data.  Whether it's a data scraper or webcrawler, every single bit of data captured by these automated beings takes away a moment of time from their ability to acquire more data from not just one site, but perhaps thousands or even billions of sites, many having multiple pages.

Next, in this conversation, it's not so much about what a visitor can view, rather it is about the actual coding an algorithm must travel in order to reach its "desired final destination."  And no matter what coding inspiration comes next to combat the damages endured by automated thoughts (or as I say AI, Automated Intelligence), Captcha was broken well over a decade ago and I am old enough (but perhaps not wise enough) to remember The Million Dollar Homepage directory that was built not just as a "fund raising" effort for its creator, but one heck of a directory with enough credibility to elevate all of the sites linked through the domain.

My point is this.  As long as your site does not violate various reasons why AI formulas should ding you into a negative (copyright violations, appearance/behavior of click-bait spam, etc.) and more to the point, as long as your users are inspired to post, collapsed view and all, screw what the webcrawlers say they want and "must have or else."

I've designed numerous sites over the decades that still remain relevant in the search engines related to their topics using the philosophy that my only goal was to design a site my audience can use FIRST and then check to make sure I wasn't crossing any lines in the build.  I still don't care how the algorithms score my tagging and categorizing of my content because end-users are more assured in finding whatever it is they are looking for.  And if we are talking numbers only, I myself am glad your board is around...even if I end up not posting much.

6.  In closing, thank you for a moment hearing out a 4 stringer and quite frankly, I cannot believe I still remember any of this stuff!  Now I gotta go color my new gray hairs with purple again for jam night Wednesday night.

PEACE AND MUSIC!

[bassplayerordinaire]

Posted by newey
about an hour ago
At one point in our (i.e., the admins) ongoing battle with the spammers, we had either theorized, or perhaps been informed somehow, that spammers were inserting a signature into their profile with their spam website link, on the idea that the search engines would "drill down" even into the footers containing their signature. they'd generate some free hits, the thinking went.

I don't have the tech saavy to know the details of search optimization, but if it can drill down into the footer, or perhaps into the user profiles, then getting beyond the collapsed view would seem to be a piece of cake. Just my 2¢.

It's more than just someone inserting a "signature" into their profile.  As the engines revolve around keywords, their "signature" does not need to be put in the profile to attract the attention of an algorithm or two, nor does the link need to be set in the same post/profile to create all sorts of ways to obscure click-fraud, or perhaps visitor fraud(?).  

Also, just to squabble, it's not a "drill down" per se, even though it likely travels down a page.  Picture the event more in a setting of a reading event, in which there is a start point, an end point and reason to travel somewhere else at some point.  Not all algorithms are designed to be seeking out a link to trigger an event.  Some algorithms could be looking for only specific keywords on a specific page with the end point being a total tally of keywords being recorded and available for further use.  Other algorithms look to the graphic content of a site, all the way down to the bolding and italics on a page.  Heck!  I grew up loving books that allowed me to choose what page to hop to, let alone Mad Libs (there goes a few more grays!).

So yes, spammers can, and perhaps were, inserting a signature into their profile.  However, it is more of a universal-related site matter rather than any one portion being exploited.  And it's more than just their hope of someone visiting their website via the link, as that website may very well be nothing more than a mini-link farm generated by AI to help elevate a pay-per-click fraud schematic or who knows what else is around these days.

Don't worry about the details of SEO.  Just keep caring about your conversation and our ability to universally connect via our music and the rest will become what it becomes.

P.S.  I would argue that your comment is far more valuable than the 2 cent price tag you put on it  But hey!  Holiday discount? 

[bassplayerordinaire]

Nov 27, 2023 18:08:02 GMT -5 col said:

Nov 26, 2023 20:29:15 GMT -5 reTrEaD said:

Probably not. AFAIK, webcrawlers don't 'see' a web page the way a human views it on the screen as presented by the browser. Instead, they see the entire page source. Although containers that are styled with "display: none;" or otherwise hidden by the browser don't appear when we view them, the contents are still in the page source. Text, links, all of it. So there isn't an 'extra click' required by the crawler to 'see' them. I reckon this will have absolutely effect on SEO.

"I could be wrong now, but I don't think so ..."

Hi reTrEaD.

Your reasoning makes sense. But Google in particular rates sites based both on content and usability. I'm unsure, but Google might ding SEO scores for extra clicks taken to reach content.

www.searchenginejournal.com/google-click-depth-matters-seo-url-structure/256779/#close

I think it is the number of clicks for a user to reach the content that's important, rather than from the web crawler's perspective (which is, as you rightly point out, unaffected).

Neither is this about accordion content - at least I don't think so. It does not appear to be relevant the situation here as the accordion pushes the important content one click further away from the community home page. But thinking about this some more, although at first glance the accordion content might seem to be of low value, it tends to be keyword-rich links to different forums/boards. So maybe the accordion forum list is not good for indexing of individuals forums/boards either.

www.seoexamples.com/p/hidden-content-in-seo-unmasking-the

www.fireandspark.com/seo-faqs/do-accordions-affect-seo/

I am not sure if any of those links fully answer the question. I'll try to look into this more tomorrow.

Click count can be valued in a variety of ways, including your point about Google designing its algorithms to discern value in "content" and "usability."

The accordion design provides a designer the opportunity to more narrowly follow their visitors behaviors.  Sure Google Analytics covers this, but along with a whole bunch of other types of tracking software (if one does not want to become a direct source for Google), nowadays software can even create "heat maps" showing graphically and in summary where someone has tried to click.  If I remember correctly, it was an add-on to a Shopify account for a music store's website and being able to see at a quick glance what areas of the site were popular and what was getting no attention was a vital choice to stay competitive with other local and online music stores (they're still online, btw).

You are part of a feedback-rich community here and I will say that the accordion format initially threw me when I first got here.  But then again, it is exactly the reason how and subsequently why I chose to visit this post in the first place.

So how does one score that now past event, figuratively speaking of course.

Unless you want to write a song about accordion bulletin boards for the accordion...as part of your effort to survey this forum?

P.S.  I have a few new gray hairs as I have not read the SEJ in well over a decade!  That was always a wild romp through content mostly over my head, but then there'd be that moment of "ah-ha!  I understand!  So now what?!?!"

[reTrEaD]

Nov 27, 2023 21:30:50 GMT -5 bassplayerordinaire said:

I am a 4 stringer

We don't discriminate. We welcome all musicians and even non-musicians. Even drummers!


I'm curious about your impression of the home page when you first saw it with the categories collapsed. Did that feed your curiosity in any way?

[reTrEaD]

Nov 27, 2023 19:35:36 GMT -5 newey said:

At one point in our (i.e., the admins) ongoing battle with the spammers, we had either theorized, or perhaps been informed somehow, that spammers were inserting a signature into their profile with their spam website link, on the idea that the search engines would "drill down" even into the footers containing their signature. they'd generate some free hits, the thinking went.

I don't have the tech saavy to know the details of search optimization, but if it can drill down into the footer, or perhaps into the user profiles, then getting beyond the collapsed view would seem to be a piece of cake. Just my 2¢.

Spam links in signatures are available to webcrawlers, but only until such time as we remove the spammer's post from public view.

Regarding user profiles, a few years ago proboards made profiles a privileged access area, for privacy reasons. Only logged-in members have access. Visitors do not and will get an error page.



I reckon crawlers quickly 'learn' to recognize that URLs which begin with https://guitarnuts2.proboards.com/user/ will lead them to the same error and won't bother chasing those down.

[sumgai]

I like to think that we (well, reTrEaD) did a lot of work devising keywords for those collapsed headers. Most of this site's design (i.e. what the user sees) falls to reTrEaD and YogiB, the rest of us have taken a "I approve" or at worst, a "I think...." approach to their works. With that said, we've had virtually no complaints from anyone since the inception of the 'new' first-time-arrival page. Not to say that you, col, are complaining, but if no one else has mentioned it in all that time... I'm somewhat 'forced' to believe that first-time newbies are not put off upon arrival to said page. Or at least they're willing to give it a try, and that's all we ask for, here in The NutzHouse.

Furthermore;

Either reTrEaD has been reading Search Engine Optimation Weekly, or else he's pretty astute all on his own. But here's something that no one's mentioned yet, and that is that in 'any' search engine operation (hereinafter styled as SE) there are not one but two algorithms going on. One is to categorize whatever is found by the search bots, and the other is to interpret what a query is actually asking, in human terms. IOW, what matches the requester's human thought processes, not what seems to be the most popular result from similar word searches. Further IOW, it's all about the context, and that's where SE's precipitate out the wannabe's to the bottom of the beaker, leaving the good ones at the top.

It is my experience that number of times you have to click through links is not germane to an SE, it's where the links point to that counts.  We all tend to forget that a search bot is not a human, and doesn't have to be.  As reTrEaD points out, bots don't care about appearances, they only care about destinations, and the contents found thereupon.  This is where SEO comes in, and where SEO/algorithm defeating spam-bots come in as well.   Appearance-to-humans aside, it's an all-out war, and I don't foresee any end to it within my lifetime.  Not even a truce, for any reason.

More than three quarters of a century that I've been here, and so far the only change I've seen is how evolving technology simply shifts the focus on how Man continues to perpetrate inhumanity upon Man.  As a famous bassplayer once said "Some people's kids!".

HTH




sumgai

[reTrEaD]

Nov 28, 2023 13:09:45 GMT -5 sumgai said:

Most of this site's design (i.e. what the user sees) falls to reTrEaD and YogiB, the rest of us have taken a "I approve" or at worst, a "I think...." approach to their works.

I'd add JohnH to the 'most of' as well. iirc he shared a lot of the grunt work with me on the transcription of the PhosteninX-Files to bbcode format. I consider myself to be an idea guy and instigator but when push comes to shove, Yogi B has proven time and time again that he's the go-to guy when it comes to solving difficult technical problems and finding ways to work smarter, not harder.

But every single member of our staff has added something of value in our staff discussions where the site content is usually subjected to decision by committee.

Nov 28, 2023 13:09:45 GMT -5 sumgai said:

Either reTrEaD has been reading Search Engine Optimation Weekly, or else he's pretty astute all on his own.

I haven't read much at all about SEO. Just a basic understanding about the difference between what the our browsers present to our screens and the information in the page source. And a very limited understanding of how a searchbot works.

They recognize the urls in links then use those for navigating the site. Text on any particular page might be important or just clutter. AI can be taught to recognize the difference.

Nov 28, 2023 13:09:45 GMT -5 sumgai said:

But here's something that no one's mentioned yet, and that is that in 'any' search engine operation (hereinafter styled as SE) there are not one but two algorithms going on. One is to categorize whatever is found by the search bots, and the other is to interpret what a query is actually asking, in human terms. IOW, what matches the requester's human thought processes, not what seems to be the most popular result from similar word searches. Further IOW, it's all about the context, and that's where SE's precipitate out the wannabe's to the bottom of the beaker, leaving the good ones at the top.

Yeah, content in context.

But there's another slightly sinister factor in what some browsers (I'm looking you, Google) use to rank the results they present to different people performing the exact same search. Your browsing history. They also use that history to decide which specific ads to bombard you with.

Way back, once upon a time, UnklMickey seemed to think the ad choice was determined by page content. That might be a factor. Or perhaps the Certified Guitar Nut had been visiting a lot of pages that referred to quack and it was based on his browsing history? idk.

guitarnuts2.proboards.com/post/1987/thread

One last item regarding bots. They eat up a LOT of pageviews. GN2 typically has about 5k page views. During any three month span, we'll see a daily spike to two, three, or even four times that, at least once, maybe as often as three times. But there isn't a predictable pattern of when that occurs.

For sure though, the October 1, 2021 spike to 75k views was definitely a bot(s). Maybe from more than one company on the same day.

[bassplayerordinaire]

Posted by reTrEaD
9 hours ago
bassplayerordinaire Avatar
21 hours ago bassplayerordinaire said:
I am a 4 stringer
We don't discriminate. We welcome all musicians and even non-musicians. Even drummers!


I'm curious about your impression of the home page when you first saw it with the categories collapsed. Did that feed your curiosity in any way?

Hmmm...did I sense an up beat knock down on the rhythm section with your emoji?   Or perhaps my new gray hairs are messing with my online banter radar...?

I do wish to point out that my initial intent had zero to do with music and everything to do with shopping for a bulletin board platform/software a local resident could use to bring local information together (i.e. city hall, park district, not-for-profits, etc.).

When I go shopping for something online, I do not tend to click through a site very extensively as I have my targeted questions I am looking for answers to and if I cannot find it through the basic template structure, I usually move on.

Since I did not initially come to your site with questions about music per se, my initial reaction to your collapsed format did not appeal to me...but remember, I was trying to imagine my own objectives using your example, so it wasn't your category naming scheme that threw me, so much as the absence of even a one sentence explanation of the forum.  The only category I couldn't guess was the "Harmonious Notes," but as you pointed out, you have even non-musicians who show up.

As I don't know if ProBoards offers the option of a one or two sentence lead for each category, my curiosity was fed by the sheer luck of timing of the thread being on the home page when I stopped by.  I had pretty well satisfied the technical points I was looking for as it relates to ProBoards, but as I mentioned in another post, I can be easily distracted by music when I am online.

In other words, your home page fed my curiosity due to the title of this thread (the collapsed view didn't do much for me).

However, it was my appreciation for the extent of consideration everyone was putting into this kind of a conversation that motivated me to just jump in and see what happens as this topic influences all of our abilities to pursue our happiness with music in our lives.

P.S.  As it is true that not all audience members will have an enjoyable experience at a concert, all any of us can do is pledge to keep giving our best efforts to the craft and if we fall short, we fall short.  Same goes for a website.

[reTrEaD]

Nov 28, 2023 19:30:58 GMT -5 bassplayerordinaire said:

Hmmm...did I sense an up beat knock down on the rhythm section with your emoji?   Or perhaps my new gray hairs are messing with my online banter radar...?

Exactly that. TiC dig. Teasing but with the intent of being playful rather than a genuine insult.

[col]

Hi all,

I've been a bit ill these past few days, so will keep this short.

Re: collapsed accordion categories.

Both me and bassplayerordinaire were momentarily caught out by the collapsed list. I suggest that some visitors will scratch their heads and move on. Maybe if every category has a chevron to the left, this might clue in visitors a little. Just a thought.

> Harmonious Notes
> Honing Your Axe
> Gearing Up!
> Makin' Music
> Chillin' Off Stage
> Members' Sites & Visitor Writes

Not perfect. But it might just encourage more clicks.

[reTrEaD]

Dec 2, 2023 19:24:53 GMT -5 col said:

I suggest that some visitors will scratch their heads and move on.

I suggest that any real guitarnut will be capable of figuring it out. If our membership has a higher ratio of real guitarnuts to people who aren't motivated to explore, would that be a bad thing?