Re: Description or Abstract?

Mike Agostino (mna@infoseek.com)
Thu, 4 Jul 1996 10:27:37 -0700

>
> I have seen a post here advocating the use of <META HTTP-EQUIV=abstract
> CONTENT="..."> and have set up my pages to use it. Recently, while
> looking at altavista and infoseek I notice they used <META
> HTTP-EQUIV=description ...>. In fact, infoseek says that if description
> is used, they will display that in the results page.
>
> My question then is which should I use? Do all search engines that pay
> attention to stuff like this use description, or do some use abstract, or
> both?
>

At Infoseek, we only pay attention to the "description" META tag. If
you use the "abstract" META tag, it will be ignored. With Infoseek, it
would be safe to include both tags. The description META tag is
included as the excerpt on the search results page modulo
truncation and removal of offending descriptions.

Mike
====================================================================
Mike Agostino mna@infoseek.com
InfoSeek Corporation
VP, Pizza Configuration
"I feel myself getting the urge to build an igloo" -- The Dead Milkmen