META TAGS (HRM/CCN-Environment)

Date: Thu, 18 Nov 1999 15:37:53 -0400 (AST)
From: "David L. Potter" <potter@chebucto.ns.ca>
To: Christopher Majka <aa051@chebucto.ns.ca>, Colin Stewart <cstewart@chebucto.ns.ca>, editors@chebucto.ns.ca
cc: "deveau, leo j. -- leo j. deveau" <ljdeveau@glinx.com>, "Douglas J. McCann" <aa935@chebucto.ns.ca>, David John Murdoch <djm@chebucto.ns.ca>
Precedence: bulk
Return-Path: <editors-mml-owner@chebucto.ns.ca>

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Hi Chris/Colin/everyone... (apologies for duplicate copies)

Last evening at the IP Committee Meeting (only Doug, Leo, and myself) 
we talked a bit about using <META Content="keyword(s)"> tags to improve 
access to information.

This becomes particularly interesting if as a result of Industry 
Canada's 'VolNet' (sp?) program we develop close relationships with 
partners such as HRM and we (each) want to provide search engine type 
access to related information such as recreation as an example.

On CCN we've used a directory structure to group Information 
Providers who share common ground.

In a distributed environment with multiple servers it becomes important 
to develop those linkages some other way,  possibly by using appropriate 
(read consistent...?) META tags.

I've done a little diging and offer the results for your 
information/comment.

---

First, (because I had it bookmarked) I had a look at the current state 
of: 	http://www.region.halifax.ns.ca/Regops/ro.html

HRM Regional Operations - with links (among others) to: 

	Metro Transit 
	Access-A-Bus , and
	Waste Resources {garbage pickup, recycling}

The only META CONTENT on these pages is: 

<META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Adobe PageMill 3.0 Win">

...which was generated by the web page software, no real descriptors to 
help a user/search enging find that page.

---

A quick/crude analysis of the CCN Environment/ directory (IP's) produced 
the following...

IP	           html Files	w/META	Directories	w/META
==================================================================
CCN index pages             2        0        1            0   
EAC Ecology Action Ctr   8609	    85       14		   9
GreenTheCity       	    2  	     0        1            0  
FNSN 			   80       28        2		   2
SCN                       211        4        2            2
NSEDC                       1        0        1            0 
NSNT		           32       19        5            3  
Oasis                       2        2        1            1 
FOMIS                      39       32        1            1 
Events (CCN ?)              1        0        1            0
SRA                        47        0        1            0
NHR (see comments below)   57       55        3            3 
CNSF                        1        0        1            0  
CPAWS                      27       17        4            2 
FSC                         1        1        1            1
RATE                      110       69        2            2 
Sierra                     41        2        3            2

**********************************************************************

I've omited from the directories 'count' any which were named image/ 
graphics/, etc...

I think it is unrealistic to expect that webmasters with large sites 
will 'refit' existing pages with META CONTENT identifiers.... however the 
refitting of index pages and eventually the development of tools 
capable of complex searching/indexing e.g.: keyword-date, 
keyword-keyword-date, keyword-keyword-keyword-date, etc.... might assist in 
making material accessible.

The NHR site has a high utilization of 'real' <META CONTENT=""> tags... 
(Chris Majka maintaines (part of?) this site... ;-) 

Some of the other sites may be producing false hits similar to the HRM site 
noted above.

david potter


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