Pagerankstatus N/A problems. PRS loves everyone but me. :(

[brainshrub]

One of my favorite extensions in Firefox is this version of a page-rank viewer:
http://pagerankstatus.mozdev.org/index.html
(Let's call it "PRS" for the rest of this thread to differentiate it from the other page-rank products.)

I love the way PRS docks itself non-obtrusively into the status bar. It works flawlessly with every site I've visited except one: My own!

When I visit my site, I get an N/A instead of a number.

Now you might be thinking: "Well Cheese70, that simply means that Google doesn't know your site exists."

Wrong! In fact, with every other page-rank tool or site brainshrub.com gets a "4" or "5". I've had my website for years and I know for a fact that Google can see me.

Take a look for yourself: www.brainshrub.com

Unless you are using PRS, you should see a four or five.

FYI: I'm using FF v1.0 and pagerankstatus v0.9.4

I have already left messages at the mozdev website, but the developer is obviously very busy creating the next wonderful extension.

I've read and re-read the User Notes and the only other person who had this problem was a guy who had a "~" in his URL... but that problem was fixed and I don't have any special characters in my URL.

It may not sound like a big deal, but seeing an n/a when I visit my own site drives me nuts. I may not be a professional web-developer, but I'm not a hack either.

Does anyone else have this problem? Does anyone have a solution? What is it about my site that makes PRS not see it?

P.S. (I have also posted this at MozillaZine.)

[charlie]

1. Try dumping

the "noindex" directive from your front page meta tags. Google honors the robots exclusions within meta tags. If you do a Google search for your site:

http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.brainshrub.com&num=20&hl=en&lr=&c2coff=1&safe=off&filter=0

you'll see that the homepage isn't indexed. Since Pagerank is page-specific, there won't be a ranking. Visiting your site's root URL should kick up an N/A because it doesn't exist in their database.

[brainshrub]

2. My front-page changes constantly.

I've studied meta-tags carefully and I've agonized for months over what you just pointed out. I don't know what I should do.

If I allow Google to Index the front-page, it will probably give incorrect information because I update that site about 3 times a week.

For example: today there is a story about Haiti on the front-page, tomorrow that story will no longer be there... it will be moved to the archives. So, if someone searches for "Haiti" on Friday and Google references them to my site... they won't find what they are looking for.

Now the archives ARE indexed... but Google can't find them either! It drives me crazy because I don't understand why. (And I've done A LOT of reading on this subject.)

I'm trying to comply with what I was told is standard blogging-protocols so that Google would shower my site with love. Instead I'm being treated like an ugly duckling. :(

Should I just say "screw it" and just let Google index the front page? Could I still respect myself in the morning?

Still, why do all the other page-rank tools see the site... but not PRS? (My understanding is that they all use the same database.)

[charlie]

3. Nevermind what I wrote, you're right

I checked your site with online Pagerank queries and received a ranking.

Maybe the problem is that Google is getting around to disallowing URLs submitted with old checksums. The extension hasn't been updated with a new checksum algorithm since it was changed in Sept:

2004-09-15:
v0.9.2: basicaly the same version as v0.9.1 but it is using the new checksum algorithm...

http://www.tapouillo.com/firefox_extension/

It looks like there's been another change since then:

http://www.prweaver.com/blog/2005/02/23/150-google-changed-the-toolbar-checksum-algorithm-again

[brainshrub]

4. Wait a sec, you might be onto to something:

Take a look at this site: http://www.scribbling.net/

For the first time I found another n/a... and sure enough her metas don't allow robots to index the front page. (In fact this is the site that taught me how to write robot tags.)

Still... I don't see why Google would penalize any site that is only trying to make life easier for Googlebot.

Any ideas how I can work around this problem?

[ConsAreLiars]

5. If main page content is relocated Google will find the new URL

and update the page reference in its database accordingly. The Haiti story will be associated with the main page until Googlebot updates the records, then the old Haiti story will linked to its archived location, and the newer story will be paired with the main page URL.

At least that is my understanding of how it works. If so, you don't have to worry about Google links to your from page becoming inaccurate.