The TAG is missing meta description and meta keywords. We believe it would rank higher in search engines with these tags set. Adding the following directive seems to generate the appropriate HTML tags: > .. meta:: > :description: This is a page in the ThinLinc Administrator's Guide! > :keywords: foo, bar, baz
Worth noting is that meta keywords are considered archaic and will probably not impact SEO performance, at least not according to Google. A meta description, on the other hand, seems will more than likely be beneficial.
Our current view is that Google and such gives good hits when searching for things. As such, the value of doing this is unclear, and it would be an ongoing cost keeping these descriptions up to date. Putting on the backlog for now.
Regarding SEO, we also have bug .
Jean and I took a look at this once again this morning, and there are quite a lot of subpar auto-generated descriptions when using Google to search the TAG. I deem this project is definitely worth a shot, despite it being relatively experimental in nature. Removing the priority for further discussions next dev meeting.
SEO work is difficult to handle as part of the development workflow. Having good previews in search results is more manageable, and should hopefully also improve our search ratings. So let's focus on that.
Some examples of bad Google descriptions: Introduction — The ThinLinc Administrator's Guide ... - Cendio Introduction¶. The ThinLinc Desktop Customizer is a combination of a web-based administration tool and a command that is run at session startup for all ... Administration of ThinLinc using the Web ... - Cendio This administration interface is installed automatically by the ThinLinc installation ... The ThinLinc Administrator's Guide. Quick search. Navigation. Advanced Topics — The ThinLinc Administrator's ... - Cendio Client Platforms →. Logo. The ThinLinc Administrator's Guide. Quick search. Navigation. Introduction. Introduction · ThinLinc Architecture. Installation. Commands on the ThinLinc Server - Cendio ... ThinLinc server that are meant for the end users or the system administrators. ... The ThinLinc Administrator's Guide. Quick search. Navigation. Introduction. The list goes on...
There are also a bunch of page titles that are excessively long. For SEO purposes, staying below 70 characters is recommended. Looking at the master branch as it looks today, less than 10% of the titles exceed this limit: > Using smart card public key authentication — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Running ThinLinc on a ThinStation terminal — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Limiting lifetime of ThinLinc sessions — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Configuring logging on ThinLinc servers — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Configuration of ThinLinc for HA operations — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Restricting access to ThinLinc servers — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Accessing client resources from the ThinLinc session — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Enabling the custom desktops for users — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Building custom Linux desktops with the ThinLinc Desktop Customizer — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide > Administration of ThinLinc using the web administration interface — ThinLinc Administrator's Guide Visually, all of these titles gets wrapped both in the left hand column and on the titles themselves. Hence, the SEO title length issues will be fixed by resolving bug 7888.
All TAG pages now have meta descriptions that summarize the page contents. Shortening the titles will be handled as part bug 7888. Meta tags will be considered snake oil not be included for now. Marking as resolved.
I've taken a look at the added meta descriptions. In general they look good -- nothing glaring that stands out. In the README.rst it is recommended that these descriptions should avoid using the terms VSM Agent and VSM Server, and instead use agent and master. There were a few files in which one could consider rephrasing the relevant parts: - HA.rst - config_logging.rst - config_vsm.rst Concerning the autotest designed to detect missing meta descriptions in our .rst files: it seems the glob operation is not properly gathering all files of interest. During my testrun, it only checked the man/*.rst files. A small modification of the glob call which returned all files of interest revealed that config_hsts.rst is missing its meta description.
Fixed. Marking as resolved.
The issues brought up in comment 11 have been resolved. Closing.
