Impact of optimization on website performance

Impact of optimization on website performance

Parramatta

Title: The Impact of Optimization on Website Performance

The digital world we inhabit is driven by speed and efficiency, where mere seconds can make the difference between a user engaging with your website or moving onto your competitor's. This critical aspect has made optimization an essential part of not just designing, but also maintaining a website. By significantly improving its performance, optimization ensures that a website delivers content quickly and efficiently to keep users engaged and satisfied.

Website optimization involves various strategies aimed at enhancing the site's loading speed, functionality, accessibility, and overall user experience. These include aspects such as reducing file sizes for faster load times, optimizing images for quicker rendering, employing SEO tactics for improved visibility in search engine results, enabling browser caching for returning visitors, among many others.

One of the most prominent benefits of website optimization is increased page speed. Users expect websites to load within two seconds or less; any longer than this can result in high bounce rates. When web pages load quickly without lagging or buffering issues, it creates a smooth browsing experience which encourages users to stay longer and explore more pages on the site.

Furthermore, search engines like Google have begun considering page speed as one of their ranking factors.

Impact of optimization on website performance - eye

  1. desktop computer
  2. server
  3. link building
Websites that are optimized properly will rank higher in search results leading to greater visibility and increased organic traffic. Thus optimization isn't only about satisfying existing users but attracting new ones too.

Another key element influenced by website optimization is mobile responsiveness. With over half of all internet traffic coming from mobile devices globally according to Statista data (2021), having a mobile-optimized site is no longer optional - it's mandatory! An optimized responsive design ensures that your site looks good and performs well on all devices regardless of screen size.



Impact of optimization on website performance - eye

  1. keyword research
  2. eye
  3. lead generation
Optimization also enhances usability by focusing on creating intuitive navigation structures and clear call-to-action elements that guide users towards desired actions such as making purchases or signing up for newsletters.

Impact of optimization on website performance - Parramatta

  1. quality assurance
  2. sustainable development
  3. technology
By providing a seamless user journey through the website without confusion or difficulty, you are likely to see increased conversion rates and lower bounce rates.

Finally, website optimization contributes to improved server performance. If your website is poorly optimized, it can put a lot of strain on your servers due to excessive requests. By reducing these requests through techniques like file minification and compression, lazy loading of images, and using Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), the load on servers is significantly decreased leading to a smoother overall performance.

In conclusion, the impact of optimization on website performance cannot be overstated. From faster page speeds to better UX/UI design elements and enhanced server efficiency - all play a crucial role in how users perceive and interact with your site. A well-optimized site not only promotes user engagement but also improves search engine visibility thereby driving more traffic towards your site. It's worth remembering that in an era where user attention spans are dwindling rapidly; optimization might just be the key between a user choosing your website over another.

Web Design Agency



 

World Wide Web
Abbreviation WWW
Year started 1989; 36 years ago (1989) by Tim Berners-Lee
Organization
  • CERN (1989–1994)
  • W3C (1994–current)
A web page from Wikipedia displayed in Google Chrome

The World Wide Web (WWW or simply the Web) is an information system that enables content sharing over the Internet through user-friendly ways meant to appeal to users beyond IT specialists and hobbyists.[1] It allows documents and other web resources to be accessed over the Internet according to specific rules of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP).[2]

The Web was invented by English computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee while at CERN in 1989 and opened to the public in 1993. It was conceived as a "universal linked information system".[3][4][5] Documents and other media content are made available to the network through web servers and can be accessed by programs such as web browsers. Servers and resources on the World Wide Web are identified and located through character strings called uniform resource locators (URLs).

The original and still very common document type is a web page formatted in Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). This markup language supports plain text, images, embedded video and audio contents, and scripts (short programs) that implement complex user interaction. The HTML language also supports hyperlinks (embedded URLs) which provide immediate access to other web resources. Web navigation, or web surfing, is the common practice of following such hyperlinks across multiple websites. Web applications are web pages that function as application software. The information in the Web is transferred across the Internet using HTTP. Multiple web resources with a common theme and usually a common domain name make up a website. A single web server may provide multiple websites, while some websites, especially the most popular ones, may be provided by multiple servers. Website content is provided by a myriad of companies, organizations, government agencies, and individual users; and comprises an enormous amount of educational, entertainment, commercial, and government information.

The Web has become the world's dominant information systems platform.[6][7][8][9] It is the primary tool that billions of people worldwide use to interact with the Internet.[2]

History

[edit]
This NeXT Computer was used by Sir Tim Berners-Lee at CERN and became the world's first Web server.

The Web was invented by English computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee while working at CERN.[10][11] He was motivated by the problem of storing, updating, and finding documents and data files in that large and constantly changing organization, as well as distributing them to collaborators outside CERN. In his design, Berners-Lee dismissed the common tree structure approach, used for instance in the existing CERNDOC documentation system and in the Unix filesystem, as well as approaches that relied in tagging files with keywords, as in the VAX/NOTES system. Instead he adopted concepts he had put into practice with his private ENQUIRE system (1980) built at CERN. When he became aware of Ted Nelson's hypertext model (1965), in which documents can be linked in unconstrained ways through hyperlinks associated with "hot spots" embedded in the text, it helped to confirm the validity of his concept.[12][13]

The historic World Wide Web logo, designed by Robert Cailliau. Currently, there is no widely accepted logo in use for the WWW.

The model was later popularized by Apple's HyperCard system. Unlike Hypercard, Berners-Lee's new system from the outset was meant to support links between multiple databases on independent computers, and to allow simultaneous access by many users from any computer on the Internet. He also specified that the system should eventually handle other media besides text, such as graphics, speech, and video. Links could refer to mutable data files, or even fire up programs on their server computer. He also conceived "gateways" that would allow access through the new system to documents organized in other ways (such as traditional computer file systems or the Usenet). Finally, he insisted that the system should be decentralized, without any central control or coordination over the creation of links.[4][14][10][11]

Berners-Lee submitted a proposal to CERN in May 1989, without giving the system a name.[4] He got a working system implemented by the end of 1990, including a browser called WorldWideWeb (which became the name of the project and of the network) and an HTTP server running at CERN. As part of that development he defined the first version of the HTTP protocol, the basic URL syntax, and implicitly made HTML the primary document format.[15] The technology was released outside CERN to other research institutions starting in January 1991, and then to the whole Internet on 23 August 1991. The Web was a success at CERN, and began to spread to other scientific and academic institutions. Within the next two years, there were 50 websites created.[16][17]

CERN made the Web protocol and code available royalty free in 1993, enabling its widespread use.[18][19] After the NCSA released the Mosaic web browser later that year, the Web's popularity grew rapidly as thousands of websites sprang up in less than a year.[20][21] Mosaic was a graphical browser that could display inline images and submit forms that were processed by the HTTPd server.[22][23] Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark founded Netscape the following year and released the Navigator browser, which introduced Java and JavaScript to the Web. It quickly became the dominant browser. Netscape became a public company in 1995 which triggered a frenzy for the Web and started the dot-com bubble.[24] Microsoft responded by developing its own browser, Internet Explorer, starting the browser wars. By bundling it with Windows, it became the dominant browser for 14 years.[25]

Berners-Lee founded the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) which created XML in 1996 and recommended replacing HTML with stricter XHTML.[26] In the meantime, developers began exploiting an IE feature called XMLHttpRequest to make Ajax applications and launched the Web 2.0 revolution. Mozilla, Opera, and Apple rejected XHTML and created the WHATWG which developed HTML5.[27] In 2009, the W3C conceded and abandoned XHTML.[28] In 2019, it ceded control of the HTML specification to the WHATWG.[29]

The World Wide Web has been central to the development of the Information Age and is the primary tool billions of people use to interact on the Internet.[30][31][32][9]

Nomenclature

[edit]

Tim Berners-Lee states that World Wide Web is officially spelled as three separate words, each capitalised, with no intervening hyphens.[33] Nonetheless, it is often called simply the Web, and also often the web; see Capitalization of Internet for details. In Mandarin Chinese, World Wide Web is commonly translated via a phono-semantic matching to wàn wéi wǎng (万维网), which satisfies www and literally means "10,000-dimensional net", a translation that reflects the design concept and proliferation of the World Wide Web.

Use of the www prefix has been declining, especially when web applications sought to brand their domain names and make them easily pronounceable. As the mobile Web grew in popularity,[citation needed] services like Gmail.com, Outlook.com, Myspace.com, Facebook.com and Twitter.com are most often mentioned without adding "www." (or, indeed, ".com") to the domain.[34]

In English, www is usually read as double-u double-u double-u.[35] Some users pronounce it dub-dub-dub, particularly in New Zealand.[36] Stephen Fry, in his "Podgrams" series of podcasts, pronounces it wuh wuh wuh.[37] The English writer Douglas Adams once quipped in The Independent on Sunday (1999): "The World Wide Web is the only thing I know of whose shortened form takes three times longer to say than what it's short for".[38]

Function

[edit]
The World Wide Web functions as an application layer protocol that is run "on top of" (figuratively) the Internet, helping to make it more functional. The advent of the Mosaic web browser helped to make the web much more usable, to include the display of images and moving images (GIFs).

The terms Internet and World Wide Web are often used without much distinction. However, the two terms do not mean the same thing. The Internet is a global system of computer networks interconnected through telecommunications and optical networking. In contrast, the World Wide Web is a global collection of documents and other resources, linked by hyperlinks and URIs. Web resources are accessed using HTTP or HTTPS, which are application-level Internet protocols that use the Internet transport protocols.[2]

Viewing a web page on the World Wide Web normally begins either by typing the URL of the page into a web browser or by following a hyperlink to that page or resource. The web browser then initiates a series of background communication messages to fetch and display the requested page. In the 1990s, using a browser to view web pages—and to move from one web page to another through hyperlinks—came to be known as 'browsing,' 'web surfing' (after channel surfing), or 'navigating the Web'. Early studies of this new behaviour investigated user patterns in using web browsers. One study, for example, found five user patterns: exploratory surfing, window surfing, evolved surfing, bounded navigation and targeted navigation.[39]

The following example demonstrates the functioning of a web browser when accessing a page at the URL http://example.org/home.html. The browser resolves the server name of the URL (example.org) into an Internet Protocol address using the globally distributed Domain Name System (DNS). This lookup returns an IP address such as 203.0.113.4 or 2001:db8:2e::7334. The browser then requests the resource by sending an HTTP request across the Internet to the computer at that address. It requests service from a specific TCP port number that is well known for the HTTP service so that the receiving host can distinguish an HTTP request from other network protocols it may be servicing. HTTP normally uses port number 80 and for HTTPS it normally uses port number 443. The content of the HTTP request can be as simple as two lines of text:

GET /home.html HTTP/1.1
Host: example.org

The computer receiving the HTTP request delivers it to web server software listening for requests on port 80. If the web server can fulfil the request it sends an HTTP response back to the browser indicating success:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8

followed by the content of the requested page. Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) for a basic web page might look like this:

<html>
  <head>
    <title>Example.org – The World Wide Web</title>
  </head>
  <body>
    <p>The World Wide Web, abbreviated as WWW and commonly known ...</p>
  </body>
</html>

The web browser parses the HTML and interprets the markup (<title>, <p> for paragraph, and such) that surrounds the words to format the text on the screen. Many web pages use HTML to reference the URLs of other resources such as images, other embedded media, scripts that affect page behaviour, and Cascading Style Sheets that affect page layout. The browser makes additional HTTP requests to the web server for these other Internet media types. As it receives their content from the web server, the browser progressively renders the page onto the screen as specified by its HTML and these additional resources.

HTML

[edit]

Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the standard markup language for creating web pages and web applications. With Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and JavaScript, it forms a triad of cornerstone technologies for the World Wide Web.[40]

Web browsers receive HTML documents from a web server or from local storage and render the documents into multimedia web pages. HTML describes the structure of a web page semantically and originally included cues for the appearance of the document.

HTML elements are the building blocks of HTML pages. With HTML constructs, images and other objects such as interactive forms may be embedded into the rendered page. HTML provides a means to create structured documents by denoting structural semantics for text such as headings, paragraphs, lists, links, quotes and other items. HTML elements are delineated by tags, written using angle brackets. Tags such as <img /> and <input /> directly introduce content into the page. Other tags such as <p> surround and provide information about document text and may include other tags as sub-elements. Browsers do not display the HTML tags, but use them to interpret the content of the page.

HTML can embed programs written in a scripting language such as JavaScript, which affects the behaviour and content of web pages. Inclusion of CSS defines the look and layout of content. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), maintainer of both the HTML and the CSS standards, has encouraged the use of CSS over explicit presentational HTML since 1997.[41]

Linking

[edit]

Most web pages contain hyperlinks to other related pages and perhaps to downloadable files, source documents, definitions and other web resources. In the underlying HTML, a hyperlink looks like this: <a href="http://example.org/home.html">Example.org Homepage</a>.

Graphic representation of a minute fraction of the WWW, demonstrating hyperlinks

Such a collection of useful, related resources, interconnected via hypertext links is dubbed a web of information. Publication on the Internet created what Tim Berners-Lee first called the WorldWideWeb (in its original CamelCase, which was subsequently discarded) in November 1990.[42]

The hyperlink structure of the web is described by the webgraph: the nodes of the web graph correspond to the web pages (or URLs) the directed edges between them to the hyperlinks. Over time, many web resources pointed to by hyperlinks disappear, relocate, or are replaced with different content. This makes hyperlinks obsolete, a phenomenon referred to in some circles as link rot, and the hyperlinks affected by it are often called "dead" links. The ephemeral nature of the Web has prompted many efforts to archive websites. The Internet Archive, active since 1996, is the best known of such efforts.

WWW prefix

[edit]

Many hostnames used for the World Wide Web begin with www because of the long-standing practice of naming Internet hosts according to the services they provide. The hostname of a web server is often www, in the same way that it may be ftp for an FTP server, and news or nntp for a Usenet news server. These hostnames appear as Domain Name System (DNS) or subdomain names, as in www.example.com. The use of www is not required by any technical or policy standard and many websites do not use it; the first web server was nxoc01.cern.ch.[43] According to Paolo Palazzi, who worked at CERN along with Tim Berners-Lee, the popular use of www as subdomain was accidental; the World Wide Web project page was intended to be published at www.cern.ch while info.cern.ch was intended to be the CERN home page; however the DNS records were never switched, and the practice of prepending www to an institution's website domain name was subsequently copied.[44][better source needed] Many established websites still use the prefix, or they employ other subdomain names such as www2, secure or en for special purposes. Many such web servers are set up so that both the main domain name (e.g., example.com) and the www subdomain (e.g., www.example.com) refer to the same site; others require one form or the other, or they may map to different web sites. The use of a subdomain name is useful for load balancing incoming web traffic by creating a CNAME record that points to a cluster of web servers. Since, currently[as of?], only a subdomain can be used in a CNAME, the same result cannot be achieved by using the bare domain root.[45][dubiousdiscuss]

When a user submits an incomplete domain name to a web browser in its address bar input field, some web browsers automatically try adding the prefix "www" to the beginning of it and possibly ".com", ".org" and ".net" at the end, depending on what might be missing. For example, entering "microsoft" may be transformed to http://www.microsoft.com/ and "openoffice" to http://www.openoffice.org. This feature started appearing in early versions of Firefox, when it still had the working title 'Firebird' in early 2003, from an earlier practice in browsers such as Lynx.[46] [unreliable source?] It is reported that Microsoft was granted a US patent for the same idea in 2008, but only for mobile devices.[47]

Scheme specifiers

[edit]

The scheme specifiers http:// and https:// at the start of a web URI refer to Hypertext Transfer Protocol or HTTP Secure, respectively. They specify the communication protocol to use for the request and response. The HTTP protocol is fundamental to the operation of the World Wide Web, and the added encryption layer in HTTPS is essential when browsers send or retrieve confidential data, such as passwords or banking information. Web browsers usually automatically prepend http:// to user-entered URIs, if omitted.

Pages

[edit]
A screenshot of the home page of Wikimedia Commons

A web page (also written as webpage) is a document that is suitable for the World Wide Web and web browsers. A web browser displays a web page on a monitor or mobile device.

The term web page usually refers to what is visible, but may also refer to the contents of the computer file itself, which is usually a text file containing hypertext written in HTML or a comparable markup language. Typical web pages provide hypertext for browsing to other web pages via hyperlinks, often referred to as links. Web browsers will frequently have to access multiple web resource elements, such as reading style sheets, scripts, and images, while presenting each web page.

On a network, a web browser can retrieve a web page from a remote web server. The web server may restrict access to a private network such as a corporate intranet. The web browser uses the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) to make such requests to the web server.

A static web page is delivered exactly as stored, as web content in the web server's file system. In contrast, a dynamic web page is generated by a web application, usually driven by server-side software. Dynamic web pages are used when each user may require completely different information, for example, bank websites, web email etc.

Static page

[edit]

A static web page (sometimes called a flat page/stationary page) is a web page that is delivered to the user exactly as stored, in contrast to dynamic web pages which are generated by a web application.

Consequently, a static web page displays the same information for all users, from all contexts, subject to modern capabilities of a web server to negotiate content-type or language of the document where such versions are available and the server is configured to do so.

Dynamic pages

[edit]
Dynamic web page: example of server-side scripting (PHP and MySQL)

A server-side dynamic web page is a web page whose construction is controlled by an application server processing server-side scripts. In server-side scripting, parameters determine how the assembly of every new web page proceeds, including the setting up of more client-side processing.

A client-side dynamic web page processes the web page using JavaScript running in the browser. JavaScript programs can interact with the document via Document Object Model, or DOM, to query page state and alter it. The same client-side techniques can then dynamically update or change the DOM in the same way.

A dynamic web page is then reloaded by the user or by a computer program to change some variable content. The updating information could come from the server, or from changes made to that page's DOM. This may or may not truncate the browsing history or create a saved version to go back to, but a dynamic web page update using Ajax technologies will neither create a page to go back to nor truncate the web browsing history forward of the displayed page. Using Ajax technologies the end user gets one dynamic page managed as a single page in the web browser while the actual web content rendered on that page can vary. The Ajax engine sits only on the browser requesting parts of its DOM, the DOM, for its client, from an application server.

Dynamic HTML, or DHTML, is the umbrella term for technologies and methods used to create web pages that are not static web pages, though it has fallen out of common use since the popularization of AJAX, a term which is now itself rarely used.[citation needed] Client-side-scripting, server-side scripting, or a combination of these make for the dynamic web experience in a browser.

JavaScript is a scripting language that was initially developed in 1995 by Brendan Eich, then of Netscape, for use within web pages.[48] The standardised version is ECMAScript.[48] To make web pages more interactive, some web applications also use JavaScript techniques such as Ajax (asynchronous JavaScript and XML). Client-side script is delivered with the page that can make additional HTTP requests to the server, either in response to user actions such as mouse movements or clicks, or based on elapsed time. The server's responses are used to modify the current page rather than creating a new page with each response, so the server needs only to provide limited, incremental information. Multiple Ajax requests can be handled at the same time, and users can interact with the page while data is retrieved. Web pages may also regularly poll the server to check whether new information is available.[49]

Website

[edit]
The usap.gov website

A website[50] is a collection of related web resources including web pages, multimedia content, typically identified with a common domain name, and published on at least one web server. Notable examples are wikipedia.org, google.com, and amazon.com.

A website may be accessible via a public Internet Protocol (IP) network, such as the Internet, or a private local area network (LAN), by referencing a uniform resource locator (URL) that identifies the site.

Websites can have many functions and can be used in various fashions; a website can be a personal website, a corporate website for a company, a government website, an organization website, etc. Websites are typically dedicated to a particular topic or purpose, ranging from entertainment and social networking to providing news and education. All publicly accessible websites collectively constitute the World Wide Web, while private websites, such as a company's website for its employees, are typically a part of an intranet.

Web pages, which are the building blocks of websites, are documents, typically composed in plain text interspersed with formatting instructions of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML, XHTML). They may incorporate elements from other websites with suitable markup anchors. Web pages are accessed and transported with the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), which may optionally employ encryption (HTTP Secure, HTTPS) to provide security and privacy for the user. The user's application, often a web browser, renders the page content according to its HTML markup instructions onto a display terminal.

Hyperlinking between web pages conveys to the reader the site structure and guides the navigation of the site, which often starts with a home page containing a directory of the site web content. Some websites require user registration or subscription to access content. Examples of subscription websites include many business sites, news websites, academic journal websites, gaming websites, file-sharing websites, message boards, web-based email, social networking websites, websites providing real-time price quotations for different types of markets, as well as sites providing various other services. End users can access websites on a range of devices, including desktop and laptop computers, tablet computers, smartphones and smart TVs.

Browser

[edit]

A web browser (commonly referred to as a browser) is a software user agent for accessing information on the World Wide Web. To connect to a website's server and display its pages, a user needs to have a web browser program. This is the program that the user runs to download, format, and display a web page on the user's computer.

In addition to allowing users to find, display, and move between web pages, a web browser will usually have features like keeping bookmarks, recording history, managing cookies (see below), and home pages and may have facilities for recording passwords for logging into websites.

The most popular browsers are Chrome, Safari, Edge, and Firefox.

Server

[edit]
The inside and front of a Dell PowerEdge web server, a computer designed for rack mounting

A Web server is server software, or hardware dedicated to running said software, that can satisfy World Wide Web client requests. A web server can, in general, contain one or more websites. A web server processes incoming network requests over HTTP and several other related protocols.

The primary function of a web server is to store, process and deliver web pages to clients.[51] The communication between client and server takes place using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). Pages delivered are most frequently HTML documents, which may include images, style sheets and scripts in addition to the text content.

Multiple web servers may be used for a high traffic website; here, Dell servers are installed together to be used for the Wikimedia Foundation.

A user agent, commonly a web browser or web crawler, initiates communication by making a request for a specific resource using HTTP and the server responds with the content of that resource or an error message if unable to do so. The resource is typically a real file on the server's secondary storage, but this is not necessarily the case and depends on how the webserver is implemented.

While the primary function is to serve content, full implementation of HTTP also includes ways of receiving content from clients. This feature is used for submitting web forms, including uploading of files.

Many generic web servers also support server-side scripting using Active Server Pages (ASP), PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor), or other scripting languages. This means that the behaviour of the webserver can be scripted in separate files, while the actual server software remains unchanged. Usually, this function is used to generate HTML documents dynamically ("on-the-fly") as opposed to returning static documents. The former is primarily used for retrieving or modifying information from databases. The latter is typically much faster and more easily cached but cannot deliver dynamic content.

Web servers can also frequently be found embedded in devices such as printers, routers, webcams and serving only a local network. The web server may then be used as a part of a system for monitoring or administering the device in question. This usually means that no additional software has to be installed on the client computer since only a web browser is required (which now is included with most operating systems).

Optical Networking

[edit]

Optical networking is a sophisticated infrastructure that utilizes optical fiber to transmit data over long distances, connecting countries, cities, and even private residences. The technology uses optical microsystems like tunable lasers, filters, attenuators, switches, and wavelength-selective switches to manage and operate these networks.[52][53]

The large quantity of optical fiber installed throughout the world at the end of the twentieth century set the foundation of the Internet as it’s used today. The information highway relies heavily on optical networking, a method of sending messages encoded in light to relay information in various telecommunication networks.[54]

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was one of the first iterations of the Internet, created in collaboration with universities and researchers 1969.[55][56][57][58] However, access to the ARPANET was limited to researchers, and in 1985, the National Science Foundation founded the National Science Foundation Network (NSFNET), a program that provided supercomputer access to researchers.[58]

Limited public access to the Internet led to pressure from consumers and corporations to privatize the network. In 1993, the US passed the National Information Infrastructure Act, which dictated that the National Science Foundation must hand over control of the optical capabilities to commercial operators.[59][60]

The privatization of the Internet and the release of the World Wide Web to the public in 1993 led to an increased demand for Internet capabilities. This spurred developers to seek solutions to reduce the time and cost of laying new fiber and increase the amount of information that can be sent on a single fiber, in order to meet the growing needs of the public.[61][62][63][64]

[edit]

An HTTP cookie (also called web cookie, Internet cookie, browser cookie, or simply cookie) is a small piece of data sent from a website and stored on the user's computer by the user's web browser while the user is browsing. Cookies were designed to be a reliable mechanism for websites to remember stateful information (such as items added in the shopping cart in an online store) or to record the user's browsing activity (including clicking particular buttons, logging in, or recording which pages were visited in the past). They can also be used to remember arbitrary pieces of information that the user previously entered into form fields such as names, addresses, passwords, and credit card numbers.

Cookies perform essential functions in the modern web. Perhaps most importantly, authentication cookies are the most common method used by web servers to know whether the user is logged in or not, and which account they are logged in with. Without such a mechanism, the site would not know whether to send a page containing sensitive information or require the user to authenticate themselves by logging in. The security of an authentication cookie generally depends on the security of the issuing website and the user's web browser, and on whether the cookie data is encrypted. Security vulnerabilities may allow a cookie's data to be read by a hacker, used to gain access to user data, or used to gain access (with the user's credentials) to the website to which the cookie belongs (see cross-site scripting and cross-site request forgery for examples).[65]

Tracking cookies, and especially third-party tracking cookies, are commonly used as ways to compile long-term records of individuals' browsing histories – a potential privacy concern that prompted European[66] and U.S. lawmakers to take action in 2011.[67][68] European law requires that all websites targeting European Union member states gain "informed consent" from users before storing non-essential cookies on their device.

Google Project Zero researcher Jann Horn describes ways cookies can be read by intermediaries, like Wi-Fi hotspot providers. When in such circumstances, he recommends using the browser in private browsing mode (widely known as Incognito mode in Google Chrome).[69]

Search engine

[edit]
The results of a search for the term "lunar eclipse" in a web-based image search engine

A web search engine or Internet search engine is a software system that is designed to carry out web search (Internet search), which means to search the World Wide Web in a systematic way for particular information specified in a web search query. The search results are generally presented in a line of results, often referred to as search engine results pages (SERPs). The information may be a mix of web pages, images, videos, infographics, articles, research papers, and other types of files. Some search engines also mine data available in databases or open directories. Unlike web directories, which are maintained only by human editors, search engines also maintain real-time information by running an algorithm on a web crawler. Internet content that is not capable of being searched by a web search engine is generally described as the deep web.

Deep web

[edit]
Deep web diagram
Deep web vs surface web
Surface Web & Deep Web

The deep web,[70] invisible web,[71] or hidden web[72] are parts of the World Wide Web whose contents are not indexed by standard web search engines. The opposite term to the deep web is the surface web, which is accessible to anyone using the Internet.[73] Computer scientist Michael K. Bergman is credited with coining the term deep web in 2001 as a search indexing term.[74]

The content of the deep web is hidden behind HTTP forms,[75][76] and includes many very common uses such as web mail, online banking, and services that users must pay for, and which is protected by a paywall, such as video on demand, some online magazines and newspapers, among others.

The content of the deep web can be located and accessed by a direct URL or IP address and may require a password or other security access past the public website page.

Caching

[edit]

A web cache is a server computer located either on the public Internet or within an enterprise that stores recently accessed web pages to improve response time for users when the same content is requested within a certain time after the original request. Most web browsers also implement a browser cache by writing recently obtained data to a local data storage device. HTTP requests by a browser may ask only for data that has changed since the last access. Web pages and resources may contain expiration information to control caching to secure sensitive data, such as in online banking, or to facilitate frequently updated sites, such as news media. Even sites with highly dynamic content may permit basic resources to be refreshed only occasionally. Web site designers find it worthwhile to collate resources such as CSS data and JavaScript into a few site-wide files so that they can be cached efficiently. Enterprise firewalls often cache Web resources requested by one user for the benefit of many users. Some search engines store cached content of frequently accessed websites.

Security

[edit]

For criminals, the Web has become a venue to spread malware and engage in a range of cybercrime, including (but not limited to) identity theft, fraud, espionage, and intelligence gathering.[77] Web-based vulnerabilities now outnumber traditional computer security concerns,[78][79] and as measured by Google, about one in ten web pages may contain malicious code.[80] Most web-based attacks take place on legitimate websites, and most, as measured by Sophos, are hosted in the United States, China and Russia.[81] The most common of all malware threats is SQL injection attacks against websites.[82] Through HTML and URIs, the Web was vulnerable to attacks like cross-site scripting (XSS) that came with the introduction of JavaScript[83] and were exacerbated to some degree by Web 2.0 and Ajax web design that favours the use of scripts.[84] In one 2007 estimate, 70% of all websites are open to XSS attacks on their users.[85] Phishing is another common threat to the Web. In February 2013, RSA (the security division of EMC) estimated the global losses from phishing at $1.5 billion in 2012.[86] Two of the well-known phishing methods are Covert Redirect and Open Redirect.

Proposed solutions vary. Large security companies like McAfee already design governance and compliance suites to meet post-9/11 regulations,[87] and some, like Finjan Holdings have recommended active real-time inspection of programming code and all content regardless of its source.[77] Some have argued that for enterprises to see Web security as a business opportunity rather than a cost centre,[88] while others call for "ubiquitous, always-on digital rights management" enforced in the infrastructure to replace the hundreds of companies that secure data and networks.[89] Jonathan Zittrain has said users sharing responsibility for computing safety is far preferable to locking down the Internet.[90]

Privacy

[edit]

Every time a client requests a web page, the server can identify the request's IP address. Web servers usually log IP addresses in a log file. Also, unless set not to do so, most web browsers record requested web pages in a viewable history feature, and usually cache much of the content locally. Unless the server-browser communication uses HTTPS encryption, web requests and responses travel in plain text across the Internet and can be viewed, recorded, and cached by intermediate systems. Another way to hide personally identifiable information is by using a virtual private network. A VPN encrypts traffic between the client and VPN server, and masks the original IP address, lowering the chance of user identification.

When a web page asks for, and the user supplies, personally identifiable information—such as their real name, address, e-mail address, etc. web-based entities can associate current web traffic with that individual. If the website uses HTTP cookies, username, and password authentication, or other tracking techniques, it can relate other web visits, before and after, to the identifiable information provided. In this way, a web-based organization can develop and build a profile of the individual people who use its site or sites. It may be able to build a record for an individual that includes information about their leisure activities, their shopping interests, their profession, and other aspects of their demographic profile. These profiles are of potential interest to marketers, advertisers, and others. Depending on the website's terms and conditions and the local laws that apply information from these profiles may be sold, shared, or passed to other organizations without the user being informed. For many ordinary people, this means little more than some unexpected emails in their inbox or some uncannily relevant advertising on a future web page. For others, it can mean that time spent indulging an unusual interest can result in a deluge of further targeted marketing that may be unwelcome. Law enforcement, counterterrorism, and espionage agencies can also identify, target, and track individuals based on their interests or proclivities on the Web.

Social networking sites usually try to get users to use their real names, interests, and locations, rather than pseudonyms, as their executives believe that this makes the social networking experience more engaging for users. On the other hand, uploaded photographs or unguarded statements can be identified to an individual, who may regret this exposure. Employers, schools, parents, and other relatives may be influenced by aspects of social networking profiles, such as text posts or digital photos, that the posting individual did not intend for these audiences. Online bullies may make use of personal information to harass or stalk users. Modern social networking websites allow fine-grained control of the privacy settings for each posting, but these can be complex and not easy to find or use, especially for beginners.[91] Photographs and videos posted onto websites have caused particular problems, as they can add a person's face to an online profile. With modern and potential facial recognition technology, it may then be possible to relate that face with other, previously anonymous, images, events, and scenarios that have been imaged elsewhere. Due to image caching, mirroring, and copying, it is difficult to remove an image from the World Wide Web.

Standards

[edit]

Web standards include many interdependent standards and specifications, some of which govern aspects of the Internet, not just the World Wide Web. Even when not web-focused, such standards directly or indirectly affect the development and administration of websites and web services. Considerations include the interoperability, accessibility and usability of web pages and web sites.

Web standards, in the broader sense, consist of the following:

Web standards are not fixed sets of rules but are constantly evolving sets of finalized technical specifications of web technologies.[98] Web standards are developed by standards organizations—groups of interested and often competing parties chartered with the task of standardization—not technologies developed and declared to be a standard by a single individual or company. It is crucial to distinguish those specifications that are under development from the ones that already reached the final development status (in the case of W3C specifications, the highest maturity level).

Accessibility

[edit]

There are methods for accessing the Web in alternative mediums and formats to facilitate use by individuals with disabilities. These disabilities may be visual, auditory, physical, speech-related, cognitive, neurological, or some combination. Accessibility features also help people with temporary disabilities, like a broken arm, or ageing users as their abilities change.[99] The Web is receiving information as well as providing information and interacting with society. The World Wide Web Consortium claims that it is essential that the Web be accessible, so it can provide equal access and equal opportunity to people with disabilities.[100] Tim Berners-Lee once noted, "The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect."[99] Many countries regulate web accessibility as a requirement for websites.[101] International co-operation in the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative led to simple guidelines that web content authors as well as software developers can use to make the Web accessible to persons who may or may not be using assistive technology.[99][102]

Internationalisation

[edit]
A global map of the Web Index for countries in 2014

The W3C Internationalisation Activity assures that web technology works in all languages, scripts, and cultures.[103] Beginning in 2004 or 2005, Unicode gained ground and eventually in December 2007 surpassed both ASCII and Western European as the Web's most frequently used character map.[104] Originally RFC 3986 allowed resources to be identified by URI in a subset of US-ASCII.

RFC 3987 allows more characters—any character in the Universal Character Set—and now a resource can be identified by IRI in any language.[105]

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
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Further reading

[edit]
  • Berners-Lee, Tim; Bray, Tim; Connolly, Dan; Cotton, Paul; Fielding, Roy; Jeckle, Mario; Lilley, Chris; Mendelsohn, Noah; Orchard, David; Walsh, Norman; Williams, Stuart (15 December 2004). "Architecture of the World Wide Web, Volume One". W3C. Version 20041215.
  • Berners-Lee, Tim (August 1996). "The World Wide Web: Past, Present and Future". W3C.
  • Brügger, Niels, ed, Web25: Histories from the first 25 years of the World Wide Web (Peter Lang, 2017).
  • Fielding, R.; Gettys, J.; Mogul, J.; Frystyk, H.; Masinter, L.; Leach, P.; Berners-Lee, T. (June 1999). "Hypertext Transfer Protocol – HTTP/1.1". Request For Comments 2616. Information Sciences Institute.
  • Niels Brügger, ed. Web History (2010) 362 pages; Historical perspective on the World Wide Web, including issues of culture, content, and preservation.
  • Polo, Luciano (2003). "World Wide Web Technology Architecture: A Conceptual Analysis". New Devices.
  • Skau, H.O. (March 1990). "The World Wide Web and Health Information". New Devices.
[edit]

 

 

User Friendly
"Press any key"
Author(s) J. D. Frazer, a.k.a. "Illiad"
Website www.userfriendly.org
Current status/schedule Completed
Launch date November 17, 1997 (1997-11-17)[# 1]
End date November 21, 2010 (2010-11-21)
Genre(s) Technology and geek humor

User Friendly was a webcomic written by J. D. Frazer, also known by his pen name Illiad. Starting in 1997, the strip was one of the earliest webcomics to make its creator a living. The comic is set in a fictional internet service provider and draws humor from dealing with clueless users and geeky subjects. The comic ran seven days a week until 2009, when updates became sporadic, and since 2010 it had been in re-runs only. The webcomic was shut down in late February 2022, after an announcement from Frazer.[1]

Premise

[edit]

User Friendly is set inside a fictional ISP, Columbia Internet.[2] According to reviewer Eric Burns, the strip is set in a world where "[u]sers were dumbasses who asked about cupholders that slid out of their computers, marketing executives were perverse and stupid and deserved humiliation, bosses were clueless and often naively cruel, and I.T. workers were somewhat shortsighted and misguided, but the last bastion of human reason... Every time we see Greg working, it's to deal with yet another annoying, self-important clueless user who hasn't gotten his brain around the digital world".[3] Although mostly gag-a-day, the comic often had ongoing running arcs and occasionally continuing character through-lines.

Cast

[edit]

A.J. Garrett

[edit]

A.J., Illiad's alter ego,[4] represents "the creative guy" in the strip, maintaining and designing websites. As a web designer, he's uncomfortably crammed in that tiny crevice between the techies and the marketing people. This means he's not disliked by anyone, but they all look at him funny from time to time. A.J. is shy and sensitive, loves most computer games and nifty art, and has a big-brother relationship with the Dust Puppy. A.J. is terrified of grues and attempts to avoid them.[# 2] He was released from the company on two separate occasions but returned shortly thereafter.

In the strip as of September 16, 2005, he and Miranda (another character) are dating. They also have previously dated, but split up over a misunderstanding.

The Chief

[edit]

The Chief is Columbia Internet's CEO. He is the leader of the techies and salespeople.

Illiad based the character on a former boss, saying, "The Chief is based on my business mentor. He was the vice president that I reported to back in the day. The Chief, like my mentor, is tall (!) and thin and sports a bushy ring around a bald crown, plus a very thick moustache." The Chief bears a superficial resemblance to the Pointy-Haired Boss of Dilbert fame. However, Illiad says that The Chief was not inspired by the Dilbert character.[# 3] His personality is very different from the PHB, as well: he manages in the laissez-faire style, as opposed to the Marketing-based, micro-managing stance of the PHB. He has encouraged the office to standardise on Linux (much to Stef's chagrin).[# 4]

Dust Puppy

[edit]

Born in a server from a combination of dust, lint, and quantum events, the Dust Puppy looks similar to a ball of dust and lint, with eyes, feet and an occasional big toothy smile. He was briefly absent from the strip after accidentally being blown with compressed air while sleeping inside a dusty server.

Although the Dust Puppy is very innocent and unworldly, he plays a superb game of Quake. He also created an artificial intelligence named Erwin, with whom he has been known to do occasional song performances (or filks).

Dust Puppy is liked by most of the other characters, with the exceptions of Stef and the Dust Puppy's evil nemesis, the Crud Puppy.

First appearance December 3, 1997.[# 5]

Crud Puppy

[edit]

Crud Puppy (Lord Ignatius Crud)[# 6] is the evil twin, born from the crud in Stef's keyboard; he is the nemesis of the Dust Puppy and sometimes takes the role of "bad guy" in the series. Examples include being the attorney/legal advisor of both Microsoft and then AOL or controlling a "Thing" suit in the Antarctic. He is most often seen in later strips in an Armani suit, usually sitting at the local bar with Cthulhu. The Crud Puppy first appeared in the strip on February 24, 1998.[# 7]

Erwin

[edit]

Erwin first appeared in the January 25, 1998 strip. Erwin is a highly advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) created overnight during experimentation in artificial intelligence by the Dust Puppy, who was feeling kind of bored. Erwin is written in COBOL[# 8] because Dust Puppy "lost a bet".[# 9] Erwin passes the Turing test with flying colours, and has a dry sense of humour. He is an expert on any subject that is covered on the World Wide Web, such as Elvis sightings and alien conspiracies. Erwin is rather self-centered, and he is fond of mischievous pranks.

Originally, Erwin occupied the classic "monitor and keyboard" type computer with an x86 computer architecture, but was later given such residences as an iMac, a Palm III, a Coleco Adam on Mir, a Furby, a nuclear weapon guidance system, an SGI O2, a Hewlett-Packard Calculator (with reverse Polish notation, which meant that Erwin talked like Yoda for weeks afterward), a Lego Mindstorms construction, a Tamagotchi, a Segway, an IBM PC 5150, a Timber Wolf-class BattleMech,[# 10] and an Internet-equipped toilet (with Dust Puppy being the toilet brush), as a punishment for insulting Hastur.

Greg Flemming

[edit]

Greg is in charge of Technical Support in the strip. In other words, he's the guy that customers whine to when something goes wrong, which drives him nuts. He blows off steam by playing visceral games and doing bad things to the salespeople. He's not a bad sort, but his grip on his sanity hovers somewhere between weak and non-existent, and he once worked for Microsoft Quality Assurance.

Mike Floyd

[edit]

Mike is the System Administrator of the strip and is responsible for the smooth running of the network at the office. He's bright but prone to fits of anxiety. His worst nightmare is being locked in a room with a sweaty Windows 95 programmer and no hacking weapons in sight.[5] He loves hot ramen straight out of a styrofoam cup.

Miranda Cornielle

[edit]

Miranda is a trained systems technologist, an experienced UNIX sysadmin, and very, very female. Her technical abilities unnerve the other techs, but her obvious physical charms compel them to stare at her, except for Pitr, who is convinced she is evil. Although she has few character flaws, she does express sadistic tendencies, especially towards marketers and lusers. Miranda finds Dust Puppy adorable.

She and A.J. are dating as of September 16, 2005, although she was previously frustrated by his inability to express himself and his love for her. This comes after years of missed opportunities and misunderstandings, such as when A.J. poured his feelings into an email and Miranda mistook it for the ILOVEYOU email worm and deleted it unread.[6]

Pitr Dubovich

[edit]

Pitr is the administrator of the Columbia Internet server and a self-proclaimed Linux guru. He suddenly began to speak with a fake Slavic accent as part of his program to "Become an Evil Genius." He has almost succeeded in taking over the planet several times. His sworn enemy is Sid, who seems to outdo him at every turn. Pitr's achievements include: making the world's (second) strongest coffee, merging Coca-Cola, Pepsi into Pitr-Cola and making Columbia Internet millions with a nuclear weapon purchased from Russia, and the infamous Vigor text editor. He briefly worked for Google, nearly succeeding in world domination, but was released from there and returned to Columbia Internet. Despite his vast efforts to become the ultimate evil character, his lack of illheartedness prevents him from reaching such achievement.

Sid Dabster

[edit]

Sid is the oldest of the geeks and very knowledgeable. His advanced age gives him the upper hand against Pitr, whom he has outdone on several occasions, including in a coffee-brewing competition and in a round of Jeopardy! that he hacked in his own favor. Unlike Pitr, he has no ambitions for world domination per se, but he is a friend of Hastur and Cthulhu (based on the H. P. Lovecraft Mythos characters). He was hired in September 2000 and he had formerly worked for Hewlett-Packard, with ten years' experience[# 11] It is his habit, unlike the other techs, to dress to a somewhat professional degree; when he first came to work, Smiling Man, the head accountant, expressed shock at the fact that Sid was wearing his usual blue business suit.[# 12] He is also a fan of old technology, having grown up in the age of TECO, PDP-6es, the original VT100, FORTRAN, IBM 3270 and the IBM 5150; one could, except for the decent taste in clothing, categorise him as a Real Programmer. He was once a cannabis smoker,[# 13] as contrasted with the rest of the technological staff, who prefer caffeine (Greg in the form of cola, Miranda in the form of espresso). This had the unfortunate effect of causing lung cancer and he was treated by an oncologist.[# 14] He has since recovered from the cancer and was told he has another 20 years or so to live.

Pearl Dabster

[edit]

Sid Dabster's beautiful daughter. The character appeared for the first time in the strip of Aug. 30, 2001.[# 15] Pearl is often seen getting the better of the boys. She is the antagonist of Miranda, and occasionally the object of Pitr's affections, much to the chagrin of Sid. Some people (both in strip and in the real world) wrongly assume that the character was named after the scripting language PERL. While this may be the true intention of the author, in the script timeline, is shown to be an error based on wordplay.[# 16]

Smiling Man

[edit]

The Smiling Man is the company comptroller. He is in charge of accounts, finances, and expenditures. He smiles all day for no reason. This in itself is enough to terrify most normal human beings (even via phone). However, the Dust Puppy, the "Evilphish", a delirious Stef, and a consultant in a purple suit have managed to get him to stop smiling first. His favourite wallpaper is a large, complex, and utterly meaningless spreadsheet.

Stef Murky

[edit]

Stef is the strip's Corporate Sales Manager. He runs most of the marketing efforts within the firm, often selling things before they exist. He is a stereotypical marketer, with an enormous ego and a condescending attitude toward the techies; they detest him and frequently retaliate with pranks. He sucks at Quake, even once managing to die at the startup screen in Quake III Arena;[# 17] in addition, he manages to die by falling into lava in any game that contains it, including games where it is normally impossible to step in said lava.[# 18] Although he admires Microsoft and frequently defends their marketing tactics, infuriating the techies, he has a real problem with Microsoft salesmen, probably because they make much more money than he does. His attitude towards women is decidedly chauvinist; he lusts after Miranda who will not have anything to do with him. Stef is definitely gormless, as demonstrated on January 14, 2005.[# 19]

Production

[edit]

In a 2008 article, reviewer Eric Burns said that as best he could tell, Frazer had produced strips seven days a week, without missing an update for, at that time, almost 11 years.[3] Frazer would draw several days' worth of comics in advance, but the Sunday comic – based on current events and in color – was always drawn for immediate release and did not relate to the regular storyline.[citation needed]

The website for User Friendly included other features such as Link of the Day and Iambe Intimate & Interactive, a weekly editorial written under the pseudonym "Iambe".[7]

In late 1999, User Friendly and Sluggy Freelance swapped a character (A.J. and Torg).[citation needed]

The strip and Loki Software teamed up for player skin and custom level contest for Quake III Arena in 2000.[8] A Flash cartoon based on the series was also produced.[9][10]

Author

[edit]

J. D. Frazer was born in 1969.[11] He began his career in law enforcement and served as a corrections officer,[12] hoping eventually to join the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, but he changed his mind, leaving law enforcement to pursue more creative endeavours.[13] He worked as a game designer, production manager, art director, project manager, Web services manager, writer, creative director, and cartoonist.[14] As of 2014 he lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.[5]

Creation

[edit]

Frazer started writing User Friendly in 1997.[2] According to Frazer, he started cartooning at age 12. He had tried to get into cartooning through syndicates with a strip called Dust Puppies, but it was rejected by six syndicates. Later, while working at an ISP, he drew some cartoons which his co-workers enjoyed. He then drew a month's worth of cartoons and posted them online. After that, he quit his job and then worked on the comic.[15]

Success

[edit]

Writer Xavier Xerxes said that in the very early days of webcomics, Frazer was probably one of the bigger success stories and was one of the first to make a living from a webcomic.[16] Eric Burns attributed initial success of the comic to the makeup of the early internet, saying, "In 1997, a disproportionate number of internet users... were in the I.T. Industry. When User Friendly began gathering momentum, there wasn't just little to nothing like it on the web -- it appealed and spoke to a much larger percentage of the internet reading audience than mainstream society would support outside of that filter.... in the waning years of the 20th Century, it was a safe bet that if someone had an internet connection in the first place, they'd find User Friendly funny."[3]

On April Fools' Day 1999, the site appeared to be shut down permanently after a third party sued.[17][18] In future years, the April 1st cartoon referenced back to the disruption that was caused.[19][20]

In a 2001 interview, Frazer said that he was not handling fame well, and pretended not to be famous in order to keep his life normal. He said that his income came from sponsorship, advertising, and sales of printed collections.[15] These compilations have been published by O'Reilly Media.[21]

Since 2000, User Friendly had been published in a variety of newspapers, including The National Post in Canada and the Linux Journal magazine.[22]

Ideas

[edit]

In a 2001 interview, Frazer estimated that about 40% of strip ideas came from reader submissions, and occasionally he would get submissions that he would use "unmodified".[23] He also said that he educated himself on the operating system BSD in order to make informed jokes about it.[15]

In 2009, Frazer was found to be copying punchlines found in the MetaFilter community. After one poster found a comment on MetaFilter that was similar to a User Friendly comic, users searched and found several other examples.[24] Initially, Frazer posted on MetaFilter saying "I get a flurry of submissions and one-liners every week, and I haven't checked many of them at all, because I rarely had to in the past" but later admitted that he had taken quotes directly from the site.[25][24] On his website, Frazer said, "I offered no attribution or asked for permission [for these punchlines], over the last couple of years I've infringed on the expression of ideas of some (who I think are) clever people. Plagiarized. My hypocrisy seems to know no bounds, as an infamous gunman was once heard saying. I sincerely apologize to my readers and to the original authors. I offer no excuses and accept full blame and responsibility. As a result, I'll be modifying the cartoons in question. No, it won't happen again. Yes, I've immersed myself in mild acid."[26]

While published books still contain at least one cartoon with a punchline taken from MetaFilter, Frazer has removed these cartoons from the website, or updated them to quote and credit the source of the punchlines, and fans searched through the archives to ensure that none of the other punchlines have been plagiarized.[27]

Suspension

[edit]

The strip went on hiatus from June 1, 2009[# 20] to August 2009 for personal reasons.[# 21] In this period, previous strips were re-posted.

A second hiatus lasted from December 1, 2009 until August 1, 2010, again for personal reasons. New cartoons, supplied by the community as part of a competition, started to appear as of August 2, 2010.[# 22]

From November 1, 2010 through November 21, 2010, Illiad published a special "Remembrance Day story arc", and stated that it is "vague and at this point random" what will happen to the strip afterwards, that "going daily again is highly unlikely", but that "there are still many stories that I want to tell through UF, over time".[# 23] Since then, previous comics have been re-posted on a daily basis.

After the de facto stop of publishing new content, three one-off comics commemoration special occasions were published:

On 24 February 2022, Illiad announced that the website would be shut down soon, "at the end of this month. If not, it won't be much later than that."[28]

At approximately midnight PST on the evening of 28 February 2022, the website was shut down.

Reviews

[edit]

User Friendly has received mixed reviews over the years.

In a 2008 review, Eric Burns of Websnark called it a "damned good comic strip", but felt it had several problems. Burns felt that the strip had not evolved in several years, saying "his strip is exactly the same today as it was in 1998... the same characters, the same humor, the same punchlines, the same punching bags as before." Burns said that characters learn no lessons, and that "[i]f Frazer uses copy and paste to put his characters in, he's been using the same clip art for the entire 21st century." Burns also criticised the stereotypical depiction of idiotic computer users as outdated. But fundamentally, Burns found the strip funny, saying anyone who had worked IT would likely find it funny, and even those who had not will find something in it amusing. Burns felt that some criticism of User Friendly came from seeing it as general webcomic, rather than one targeted at a specific audience of old-school IT geeks, and he considered that the targeted approach was a good business model.[3]

Writer T Campbell declared JD Frazer's work as "ow[ing] a heavy debt to [Scott] Adams, but his 'nerdcore' was a purer sort: the jokes were often for nerds ONLY-- NO NON-TECHIES ALLOWD [sic]." He continued "He wasn't the first webtoonist to target his audience so precisely, but he was the first to do it on a daily schedule, and that kind of single-minded dedication is something most techies could appreciate. User Friendly set the tone for nerdcore strips to follow."[29] Time magazine called User Friendly "a strip in the wry, verbal vein of Doonesbury...the humor is a combination of pop culture references and inside jokes straight outta the IT department."[30] The strip was among the most notable of a wave of similar strips, including Help Desk by Christopher B. Wright,[31] General Protection Fault by Jeffrey T. Darlington,[32] The PC Weenies by Krishna Sadasivam,[33] Geek & Poke by Oliver Widder,[34] Working Daze by John Zakour, and The Joy of Tech by Liza Schmalcel and Bruce Evans.

Comic writer and artist Joe Zabel said that User Friendly "may be one of the earliest webcomics manifestation of the use of templates... renderings of the characters that are cut and pasted directly into the comic strip... I think the main significance of User Friendly is that in 1997 it was really, really crude in every respect. Horrible artwork, terrible storyline, zilch characterization, and extremely dull, obvious jokes. And yet it was a smash hit! I think this demonstrates that the public will embrace just about anything if it's free and the circumstances are right. And it indicates that new internet users of the time were really hungry, downright starving, for entertainment.... his current work [speaking in 2005] is comparatively slick and professional. But I suspect that his early work had enormous influence, because it encouraged thousands of people with few skills and little talent to jump into the webcomics field." Zabel also credited User Friendly's success in part to its "series mascot", Dust Puppy, saying that "the popular gag-a-day cartoons almost always have some kind of mascot."[29]

The webcomic Penny Arcade produced a strip in 1999 just to criticise Frazer, saying "people will pass up steak once a week for crap every day."[35] They also criticized the commercialism of the enterprise.[36] By contrast, CNET included it on 2007 a list of "sidesplitting tech comics",[33] Mashable included it in a 2009 list of the 20 best webcomics[2] and Polygon listed it as one of the most influential webcomics of all time in 2018.[37] It has also been noted by FromDev,[38] Brainz,[39] RiskOptics,[40] DondeQ2,[41] and Pingdom.[31] CBR.com concluded the comic had aged poorly in a 2023 rundown.[42]

Lawrence I. Charters appreciated the nature of the titles used for the published books.[43] Francis Glassborow cited the specificity of the humour,[44] which also lead Retro Activity to find the strip "difficult to recommend" along with the limited art style.[45] Mike Kaltschnee also mentioned the weakness of the art, but was impressed at Illiad maintaining publication of a strip every day.[46] "Webcomics: The Influence and Continuation of the Comix Revolution" described how the strip represented the counter-cultural aspects of the open-source software movement.[47] Dustin Puryear observed how the strip represents the conflicts between the computer literate and newer less informed users.[48] Christine Moellenberndt wrote about the online community spawned around the comic strip.[49]

In 2007, User Friendly was part of an exhibit at The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art called Infinite Canvas: The Art of Webcomics.[50]

Bibliography

[edit]

Several cartoon compilations have been published:

  • User Friendly, v1.0, Plan Nine Publishing, 2002, ISBN 1-929462-39-5 (collects earlier strips)
  • User Friendly, O'Reilly, 1999, ISBN 1-56592-673-0 January 25, 1998 Archived July 5, 2013, at archive.todayDecember 25, 1998 (misses out December 20 Archived November 13, 2005, at the Wayback Machine and probably some others)
  • Evil Geniuses in a Nutshell, O'Reilly, 2000, ISBN 1-56592-861-X January 3, 1999December 11, 1999
  • The Root of All Evil, O'Reilly, 2001, ISBN 0-596-00193-2 January 1, 2000December 31, 2000
  • Even Grues Get Full, O'Reilly, 2003, ISBN 0-596-00566-0 January 1, 2001November 17, 2001
  • User Friendly – Die Deutsche Dialekt-Ausgabe (translation to several German dialects) ISBN 3-89721-380-X
  • Ten Years of UserFriendly.Org, Manning Dec 2008, ISBN 978-1-935182-12-2 a 1000-page hardback collection of every script with some comments by the author.

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "UserFriendly Strip Comments". February 26, 2022. Archived from the original on February 26, 2022. Retrieved March 1, 2022.
  2. ^ a b c P. Aune, Sean (March 3, 2009). "20 of the Best Web Comics". Mashable. Archived from the original on April 26, 2018. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  3. ^ a b c d Burns, Eric (May 2008). "Eric: State of the (Web)Cartoonist: J.D. "Illiad" Frazer". Websnark. Archived from the original on June 1, 2008. Retrieved November 16, 2020.
  4. ^ Frazer, J. D. (March 2002). User Friendly v1.0. Plan Nine Publishing. p. 67. ISBN 1-929462-39-5.
  5. ^ a b Illiad. "UF Cartoon Archive - Character Gallery - Mike". www.userfriendly.org.
  6. ^ Illiad. "UserFriendly Strip Comments". ars.userfriendly.org.
  7. ^ Iambe Intimate & Interactive site page, http://www.userfriendly.org/community/iambe/
  8. ^ Gasperson, Tina (September 21, 2000). "Loki and Userfriendly sponsor Quake III skins contest". Linux.com. Retrieved February 27, 2023.
  9. ^ Smith, JT (September 18, 2000). "VFS Live to stream interview with Illiad and WebDi". Linux.com. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  10. ^ "User Friendly Animation Episode 1 - Play Online on Flash Museum 🕹️". Flash Museum. April 16, 2024.
  11. ^ Illiad (2006). Money for content and your clicks for free : turning web sites, blogs, and podcasts into cash. Indianapolis: Wiley. ISBN 978-0-471-74753-6. OCLC 64089426.
  12. ^ Frazer, J. D. (September 28, 2006). "What job/career have you had that you wouldn't recommend to anyone?". User Friendly. Retrieved September 29, 2006.
  13. ^ Brown, Janelle (October 27, 1999). "Cartoon for coders". Salon. Retrieved June 5, 2024.
  14. ^ "Even Grues Get Full - tech humor book review". www.kickstartnews.com. Retrieved April 1, 2021.
  15. ^ a b c Coleman, Chris (February 9, 2001). "An Interview With Illiad". ONLamp. Archived from the original on January 5, 2002. Retrieved July 5, 2008.
  16. ^ Xerxes, Xaviar (January 2007). "Biggie Panda: Old Skool Webcomics". COMIXtalk. Archived from the original on September 2, 2011. Retrieved July 5, 2008.
  17. ^ Whitinger, Dave (April 1, 1999). "Segfault.org and UserFriendly.org get shut down". Linux Today. Archived from the original on June 6, 2019. Retrieved October 5, 2024.
  18. ^ Whitinger, Dave (April 1, 1999). "April Fools!". Linux Today. Archived from the original on December 11, 2020. Retrieved October 4, 2024.
  19. ^ April 1, 2000 Cartoon, https://web.archive.org/web/20220225214636/http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20000401
  20. ^ April 1, 2004 Cartoon, https://web.archive.org/web/20220226103320/http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20040401
  21. ^ "O'Reilly Releases "The Root of All Evil"--Latest Exploits of User Friendly's Dust Puppy & Gang". O'Reilly Media. September 4, 2001. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  22. ^ Lucas, Josh (September 1, 1999). "Dilbert Killer". Wired. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  23. ^ Brown, Janelle (October 27, 1999). "Cartoon for coders". Salon.com. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  24. ^ a b Social Pressure Can Solve The 'Copying' Problem Even Without Copyright, Techdirt, February 23, 2009.
  25. ^ "Wha Wha Wibble". metatalk.metafilter.com. Retrieved November 16, 2020.
  26. ^ Frazer, J.D. (February 23, 2009). "[Illiad] BEYOND THE PALE AND AN APOLOGY". User Friendly. Archived from the original on May 18, 2019. Retrieved November 16, 2020.
  27. ^ Frazer, J.D. (March 13, 2009). "[Illiad] FIXED, AND WILL CONTINUE FIXING". User Friendly. Archived from the original on June 21, 2019. Retrieved October 4, 2024.
  28. ^ "HEADS UP: We're Going Dark", Illiad, 2022-02-24
  29. ^ a b Zabel, Joseph ‘Joe’; et al. (September 30, 2005). "The Artistic History of Webcomics: A Webcomics Examiner Roundtable". The Webcomics Examiner. Archived from the original on November 24, 2005. Retrieved July 7, 2008.
  30. ^ Worthy (November 22, 2022). "User Friendly". Everything2. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  31. ^ a b SolarWinds Worldwide (January 16, 2009). "7 tech comics that will put a big smile on your face". Pingdom. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  32. ^ ""User Friendly" and "GPF" Creators on Comics and Operating Systems". Linux Today. November 8, 2005. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  33. ^ a b Dolcourt, Jessica (September 10, 2007). "Sidesplitting tech comics". CNET. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  34. ^ Francis, Carol (June 17, 2013). "The Best Entertaining Online Web Tech Comics". oneextrapixel. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  35. ^ Holkins, Jerry; Mike, Krahulik (April 7, 1999). "Illiad: Not Funny". Penny Arcade. Retrieved November 16, 2020.
  36. ^ dragoon (August 20, 2000). "User Friendly Media". Everything2. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  37. ^ Jensen, K. Thor (November 27, 2018). "The most influential webcomics of all time". Polygon. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  38. ^ Dubey, Sarikaz (May 14, 2014). "Awesome Geek Comics Websites". FromDev. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  39. ^ "20 Funny Web Comics You'd Love To Read". Brainz. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  40. ^ Riskoptics (March 3, 2017). "6 InfoSec Cartoons & Webcomics to Brighten a Gloomy Week". RiskOptics. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  41. ^ "Quake Funny Pages: >Byte Me_, Dilbert, Penny Arcade and User Friendly". DondeQ2. November 14, 2018. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  42. ^ Trinos, Angelo Delos (August 8, 2023). "10 Great Webcomics That Aged Poorly". CBR.com. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  43. ^ Charters, Lawrence I. (2002). "The Root of All Evil: A Review". Washington Apple Pi Journal. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  44. ^ Glassborow, Francis (October 2003). "Even Grues Get Full - The Fourth User Friendly Collection". ACCU. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  45. ^ "Entry 9: 'User Friendly'". Retro Activity. April 27, 2016. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  46. ^ Kaltschnee, Mike. "User Friendly - A cartoon book for geeks". dacs.doc electric. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  47. ^ Fenty, Sean; Houp, Trena; Taylor, Laurie (May 2005). "Webcomics: The Influence and Continuation of the Comix Revolution". ImageText. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  48. ^ Puryear, Dustin (September 25, 2000). "A Review of Evil Geniuses In A Nutshell". 32BitsOnline. Archived from the original on April 9, 2001. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  49. ^ Moellenberndt, Christine (May 6, 2022). "Requiem for a Community; What i learned about community from an online comic strip". LinkedIn. Retrieved March 2, 2024.
  50. ^ "Webcomics show at MoCCA". The Beat. September 5, 2007. Archived from the original on September 25, 2011. Retrieved November 16, 2020.

Story notes

[edit]
  1. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (November 17, 1997), "Cartoon with Strip Comments", UserFriendly.
  2. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 17, 2002), "Strip Comments", UserFriendly.
  3. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (July 18, 2006), "Strip Comments", UserFriendly.
  4. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 8, 1998), User Friendly (cartoon).
  5. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (December 3, 1997), "Dust Puppy's first appearance", User Friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on January 1, 2015, retrieved February 13, 2012
  6. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (September 15, 2005), "Nag strip", User Friendly.
  7. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (April 5, 1998), "Anatomy of a Crud Puppy", User Friendly (cartoon).
  8. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 18, 2000), User Friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on September 26, 2017, retrieved August 20, 2011.
  9. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 19, 2000), User Friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on November 27, 2002, retrieved August 29, 2011.
  10. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 4, 2001), User Friendly (cartoon).
  11. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (September 26, 2000), User Friendly (cartoon).
  12. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (September 27, 2000), User Friendly (cartoon).
  13. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (May 7, 2001), User friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on December 17, 2002, retrieved August 28, 2009.
  14. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 14, 2009), User Friendly (cartoon).
  15. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (August 30, 2001), User Friendly (cartoon).
  16. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (August 31, 2001), User Friendly (cartoon).
  17. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (March 17, 2000), User Friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on July 11, 2002, retrieved February 25, 2008.
  18. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 14, 2006), User Friendly (cartoon), archived from the original on May 5, 2019, retrieved November 13, 2008.
  19. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (January 14, 2005), "Strip Comments", User Friendly (UserFriendly).
  20. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (June 1, 2009), User Friendly.
  21. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’, "June & July", User Friendly (re-runs), archived from the original on May 14, 2019, retrieved June 1, 2009.
  22. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (August 2, 2010), User Friendly.
  23. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’, "Remembrance Day Story Arc & Other Matters", User Friendly.
  24. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (March 19, 2011), User Friendly.
  25. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (October 9, 2011), User Friendly.
  26. ^ Frazer, JD ‘Illiad’ (January 1, 2012), User Friendly.
[edit]

 

 

Google Search
Google Search on desktop
Type of site
Web search engine
Available in 149 languages
Owner Google
Revenue Google Ads
URL google.com Edit this at Wikidata
IPv6 support Yes[1]
Commercial Yes
Registration Optional
Launched
  • 1995; 30 years ago (1995) (first prototype)
  • 1997; 28 years ago (1997) (final launch)
Current status Online
Written in

Google Search (also known simply as Google or Google.com) is a search engine operated by Google. It allows users to search for information on the Web by entering keywords or phrases. Google Search uses algorithms to analyze and rank websites based on their relevance to the search query. It is the most popular search engine worldwide.

Google Search is the most-visited website in the world. As of 2020, Google Search has a 92% share of the global search engine market.[3] Approximately 26.75% of Google's monthly global traffic comes from the United States, 4.44% from India, 4.4% from Brazil, 3.92% from the United Kingdom and 3.84% from Japan according to data provided by Similarweb.[4]

The order of search results returned by Google is based, in part, on a priority rank system called "PageRank". Google Search also provides many different options for customized searches, using symbols to include, exclude, specify or require certain search behavior, and offers specialized interactive experiences, such as flight status and package tracking, weather forecasts, currency, unit, and time conversions, word definitions, and more.

The main purpose of Google Search is to search for text in publicly accessible documents offered by web servers, as opposed to other data, such as images or data contained in databases. It was originally developed in 1996 by Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Scott Hassan.[5][6][7] The search engine would also be set up in the garage of Susan Wojcicki's Menlo Park home.[8] In 2011, Google introduced "Google Voice Search" to search for spoken, rather than typed, words.[9] In 2012, Google introduced a semantic search feature named Knowledge Graph.

Analysis of the frequency of search terms may indicate economic, social and health trends.[10] Data about the frequency of use of search terms on Google can be openly inquired via Google Trends and have been shown to correlate with flu outbreaks and unemployment levels, and provide the information faster than traditional reporting methods and surveys. As of mid-2016, Google's search engine has begun to rely on deep neural networks.[11]

In August 2024, a US judge in Virginia ruled that Google's search engine held an illegal monopoly over Internet search.[12][13] The court found that Google maintained its market dominance by paying large amounts to phone-makers and browser-developers to make Google its default search engine.[14]

Search indexing

[edit]

Google indexes hundreds of terabytes of information from web pages.[15] For websites that are currently down or otherwise not available, Google provides links to cached versions of the site, formed by the search engine's latest indexing of that page.[16] Additionally, Google indexes some file types, being able to show users PDFs, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, PowerPoint presentations, certain Flash multimedia content, and plain text files.[17] Users can also activate "SafeSearch", a filtering technology aimed at preventing explicit and pornographic content from appearing in search results.[18]

Despite Google search's immense index, sources generally assume that Google is only indexing less than 5% of the total Internet, with the rest belonging to the deep web, inaccessible through its search tools.[15][19][20]

In 2012, Google changed its search indexing tools to demote sites that had been accused of piracy.[21] In October 2016, Gary Illyes, a webmaster trends analyst with Google, announced that the search engine would be making a separate, primary web index dedicated for mobile devices, with a secondary, less up-to-date index for desktop use. The change was a response to the continued growth in mobile usage, and a push for web developers to adopt a mobile-friendly version of their websites.[22][23] In December 2017, Google began rolling out the change, having already done so for multiple websites.[24]

"Caffeine" search architecture upgrade

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In August 2009, Google invited web developers to test a new search architecture, codenamed "Caffeine", and give their feedback. The new architecture provided no visual differences in the user interface, but added significant speed improvements and a new "under-the-hood" indexing infrastructure. The move was interpreted in some quarters as a response to Microsoft's recent release of an upgraded version of its own search service, renamed Bing, as well as the launch of Wolfram Alpha, a new search engine based on "computational knowledge".[25][26] Google announced completion of "Caffeine" on June 8, 2010, claiming 50% fresher results due to continuous updating of its index.[27]

With "Caffeine", Google moved its back-end indexing system away from MapReduce and onto Bigtable, the company's distributed database platform.[28][29]

"Medic" search algorithm update

[edit]

In August 2018, Danny Sullivan from Google announced a broad core algorithm update. As per current analysis done by the industry leaders Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Land, the update was to drop down the medical and health-related websites that were not user friendly and were not providing good user experience. This is why the industry experts named it "Medic".[30]

Google reserves very high standards for YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) pages. This is because misinformation can affect users financially, physically, or emotionally. Therefore, the update targeted particularly those YMYL pages that have low-quality content and misinformation. This resulted in the algorithm targeting health and medical-related websites more than others. However, many other websites from other industries were also negatively affected.[31]

Search results

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Ranking of results

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By 2012, it handled more than 3.5 billion searches per day.[32] In 2013 the European Commission found that Google Search favored Google's own products, instead of the best result for consumers' needs.[33] In February 2015 Google announced a major change to its mobile search algorithm which would favor mobile friendly over other websites. Nearly 60% of Google searches come from mobile phones. Google says it wants users to have access to premium quality websites. Those websites which lack a mobile-friendly interface would be ranked lower and it is expected that this update will cause a shake-up of ranks. Businesses who fail to update their websites accordingly could see a dip in their regular websites traffic.[34]

PageRank

[edit]

Google's rise was largely due to a patented algorithm called PageRank which helps rank web pages that match a given search string.[35] When Google was a Stanford research project, it was nicknamed BackRub because the technology checks backlinks to determine a site's importance. Other keyword-based methods to rank search results, used by many search engines that were once more popular than Google, would check how often the search terms occurred in a page, or how strongly associated the search terms were within each resulting page. The PageRank algorithm instead analyzes human-generated links assuming that web pages linked from many important pages are also important. The algorithm computes a recursive score for pages, based on the weighted sum of other pages linking to them. PageRank is thought to correlate well with human concepts of importance. In addition to PageRank, Google, over the years, has added many other secret criteria for determining the ranking of resulting pages. This is reported to comprise over 250 different indicators,[36][37] the specifics of which are kept secret to avoid difficulties created by scammers and help Google maintain an edge over its competitors globally.

PageRank was influenced by a similar page-ranking and site-scoring algorithm earlier used for RankDex, developed by Robin Li in 1996. Larry Page's patent for PageRank filed in 1998 includes a citation to Li's earlier patent. Li later went on to create the Chinese search engine Baidu in 2000.[38][39]

In a potential hint of Google's future direction of their Search algorithm, Google's then chief executive Eric Schmidt, said in a 2007 interview with the Financial Times: "The goal is to enable Google users to be able to ask the question such as 'What shall I do tomorrow?' and 'What job shall I take?'".[40] Schmidt reaffirmed this during a 2010 interview with The Wall Street Journal: "I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions, they want Google to tell them what they should be doing next."[41]

Google optimization

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Because Google is the most popular search engine, many webmasters attempt to influence their website's Google rankings. An industry of consultants has arisen to help websites increase their rankings on Google and other search engines. This field, called search engine optimization, attempts to discern patterns in search engine listings, and then develop a methodology for improving rankings to draw more searchers to their clients' sites. Search engine optimization encompasses both "on page" factors (like body copy, title elements, H1 heading elements and image alt attribute values) and Off Page Optimization factors (like anchor text and PageRank). The general idea is to affect Google's relevance algorithm by incorporating the keywords being targeted in various places "on page", in particular the title element and the body copy (note: the higher up in the page, presumably the better its keyword prominence and thus the ranking). Too many occurrences of the keyword, however, cause the page to look suspect to Google's spam checking algorithms. Google has published guidelines for website owners who would like to raise their rankings when using legitimate optimization consultants.[42] It has been hypothesized, and, allegedly, is the opinion of the owner of one business about which there have been numerous complaints, that negative publicity, for example, numerous consumer complaints, may serve as well to elevate page rank on Google Search as favorable comments.[43] The particular problem addressed in The New York Times article, which involved DecorMyEyes, was addressed shortly thereafter by an undisclosed fix in the Google algorithm. According to Google, it was not the frequently published consumer complaints about DecorMyEyes which resulted in the high ranking but mentions on news websites of events which affected the firm such as legal actions against it. Google Search Console helps to check for websites that use duplicate or copyright content.[44]

"Hummingbird" search algorithm upgrade

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In 2013, Google significantly upgraded its search algorithm with "Hummingbird". Its name was derived from the speed and accuracy of the hummingbird.[45] The change was announced on September 26, 2013, having already been in use for a month.[46] "Hummingbird" places greater emphasis on natural language queries, considering context and meaning over individual keywords.[45] It also looks deeper at content on individual pages of a website, with improved ability to lead users directly to the most appropriate page rather than just a website's homepage.[47] The upgrade marked the most significant change to Google search in years, with more "human" search interactions[48] and a much heavier focus on conversation and meaning.[45] Thus, web developers and writers were encouraged to optimize their sites with natural writing rather than forced keywords, and make effective use of technical web development for on-site navigation.[49]

Search results quality

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In 2023, drawing on internal Google documents disclosed as part of the United States v. Google LLC (2020) antitrust case, technology reporters claimed that Google Search was "bloated and overmonetized"[50] and that the "semantic matching" of search queries put advertising profits before quality.[51] Wired withdrew Megan Gray's piece after Google complained about alleged inaccuracies, while the author reiterated that «As stated in court, "A goal of Project Mercury was to increase commercial queries"».[52]

In March 2024, Google announced a significant update to its core search algorithm and spam targeting, which is expected to wipe out 40 percent of all spam results.[53] On March 20th, it was confirmed that the roll out of the spam update was complete.[54]

[edit]

On September 10, 2024, the European-based EU Court of Justice found that Google held an illegal monopoly with the way the company showed favoritism to its shopping search, and could not avoid paying €2.4 billion.[55] The EU Court of Justice referred to Google's treatment of rival shopping searches as "discriminatory" and in violation of the Digital Markets Act.[55]

Interface

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Page layout

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At the top of the search page, the approximate result count and the response time two digits behind decimal is noted. Of search results, page titles and URLs, dates, and a preview text snippet for each result appears. Along with web search results, sections with images, news, and videos may appear.[56] The length of the previewed text snipped was experimented with in 2015 and 2017.[57][58]

[edit]

"Universal search" was launched by Google on May 16, 2007, as an idea that merged the results from different kinds of search types into one. Prior to Universal search, a standard Google search would consist of links only to websites. Universal search, however, incorporates a wide variety of sources, including websites, news, pictures, maps, blogs, videos, and more, all shown on the same search results page.[59][60] Marissa Mayer, then-vice president of search products and user experience, described the goal of Universal search as "we're attempting to break down the walls that traditionally separated our various search properties and integrate the vast amounts of information available into one simple set of search results.[61]

In June 2017, Google expanded its search results to cover available job listings. The data is aggregated from various major job boards and collected by analyzing company homepages. Initially only available in English, the feature aims to simplify finding jobs suitable for each user.[62][63]

Rich snippets

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In May 2009, Google announced that they would be parsing website microformats to populate search result pages with "Rich snippets". Such snippets include additional details about results, such as displaying reviews for restaurants and social media accounts for individuals.[64]

In May 2016, Google expanded on the "Rich snippets" format to offer "Rich cards", which, similarly to snippets, display more information about results, but shows them at the top of the mobile website in a swipeable carousel-like format.[65] Originally limited to movie and recipe websites in the United States only, the feature expanded to all countries globally in 2017.[66]

Knowledge Graph

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The Knowledge Graph is a knowledge base used by Google to enhance its search engine's results with information gathered from a variety of sources.[67] This information is presented to users in a box to the right of search results.[68] Knowledge Graph boxes were added to Google's search engine in May 2012,[67] starting in the United States, with international expansion by the end of the year.[69] The information covered by the Knowledge Graph grew significantly after launch, tripling its original size within seven months,[70] and being able to answer "roughly one-third" of the 100 billion monthly searches Google processed in May 2016.[71] The information is often used as a spoken answer in Google Assistant[72] and Google Home searches.[73] The Knowledge Graph has been criticized for providing answers without source attribution.[71]

Google Knowledge Panel

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A Google Knowledge Panel[74] is a feature integrated into Google search engine result pages, designed to present a structured overview of entities such as individuals, organizations, locations, or objects directly within the search interface. This feature leverages data from Google's Knowledge Graph,[75] a database that organizes and interconnects information about entities, enhancing the retrieval and presentation of relevant content to users.

The content within a Knowledge Panel[76] is derived from various sources, including Wikipedia and other structured databases, ensuring that the information displayed is both accurate and contextually relevant. For instance, querying a well-known public figure may trigger a Knowledge Panel displaying essential details such as biographical information, birthdate, and links to social media profiles or official websites.

The primary objective of the Google Knowledge Panel is to provide users with immediate, factual answers, reducing the need for extensive navigation across multiple web pages.

Personal tab

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In May 2017, Google enabled a new "Personal" tab in Google Search, letting users search for content in their Google accounts' various services, including email messages from Gmail and photos from Google Photos.[77][78]

Google Discover

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Google Discover, previously known as Google Feed, is a personalized stream of articles, videos, and other news-related content. The feed contains a "mix of cards" which show topics of interest based on users' interactions with Google, or topics they choose to follow directly.[79] Cards include, "links to news stories, YouTube videos, sports scores, recipes, and other content based on what [Google] determined you're most likely to be interested in at that particular moment."[79] Users can also tell Google they're not interested in certain topics to avoid seeing future updates.

Google Discover launched in December 2016[80] and received a major update in July 2017.[81] Another major update was released in September 2018, which renamed the app from Google Feed to Google Discover, updated the design, and adding more features.[82]

Discover can be found on a tab in the Google app and by swiping left on the home screen of certain Android devices. As of 2019, Google will not allow political campaigns worldwide to target their advertisement to people to make them vote.[83]

AI Overviews

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At the 2023 Google I/O event in May, Google unveiled Search Generative Experience (SGE), an experimental feature in Google Search available through Google Labs which produces AI-generated summaries in response to search prompts.[84] This was part of Google's wider efforts to counter the unprecedented rise of generative AI technology, ushered by OpenAI's launch of ChatGPT, which sent Google executives to a panic due to its potential threat to Google Search.[85] Google added the ability to generate images in October.[86] At I/O in 2024, the feature was upgraded and renamed AI Overviews.[87]

"cheese not sticking to pizza"
Early AI Overview response to the problem of "cheese not sticking to pizza"

AI Overviews was rolled out to users in the United States in May 2024.[87] The feature faced public criticism in the first weeks of its rollout after errors from the tool went viral online. These included results suggesting users add glue to pizza or eat rocks,[88] or incorrectly claiming Barack Obama is Muslim.[89] Google described these viral errors as "isolated examples", maintaining that most AI Overviews provide accurate information.[88][90] Two weeks after the rollout of AI Overviews, Google made technical changes and scaled back the feature, pausing its use for some health-related queries and limiting its reliance on social media posts.[91] Scientific American has criticised the system on environmental grounds, as such a search uses 30 times more energy than a conventional one.[92] It has also been criticized for condensing information from various sources, making it less likely for people to view full articles and websites. When it was announced in May 2024, Danielle Coffey, CEO of the News/Media Alliance was quoted as saying "This will be catastrophic to our traffic, as marketed by Google to further satisfy user queries, leaving even less incentive to click through so that we can monetize our content."[93]

In August 2024, AI Overviews were rolled out in the UK, India, Japan, Indonesia, Mexico and Brazil, with local language support.[94] On October 28, 2024, AI Overviews was rolled out to 100 more countries, including Australia and New Zealand.[95]

Redesigns

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Product Sans, Google's typeface since 2015

In late June 2011, Google introduced a new look to the Google homepage in order to boost the use of the Google+ social tools.[96]

One of the major changes was replacing the classic navigation bar with a black one. Google's digital creative director Chris Wiggins explains: "We're working on a project to bring you a new and improved Google experience, and over the next few months, you'll continue to see more updates to our look and feel."[97] The new navigation bar has been negatively received by a vocal minority.[98]

In November 2013, Google started testing yellow labels for advertisements displayed in search results, to improve user experience. The new labels, highlighted in yellow color, and aligned to the left of each sponsored link help users differentiate between organic and sponsored results.[99]

On December 15, 2016, Google rolled out a new desktop search interface that mimics their modular mobile user interface. The mobile design consists of a tabular design that highlights search features in boxes. and works by imitating the desktop Knowledge Graph real estate, which appears in the right-hand rail of the search engine result page, these featured elements frequently feature Twitter carousels, People Also Search For, and Top Stories (vertical and horizontal design) modules. The Local Pack and Answer Box were two of the original features of the Google SERP that were primarily showcased in this manner, but this new layout creates a previously unseen level of design consistency for Google results.[100]

Smartphone apps

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Google offers a "Google Search" mobile app for Android and iOS devices.[101] The mobile apps exclusively feature Google Discover and a "Collections" feature, in which the user can save for later perusal any type of search result like images, bookmarks or map locations into groups.[102] Android devices were introduced to a preview of the feed, perceived as related to Google Now, in December 2016,[103] while it was made official on both Android and iOS in July 2017.[104][105]

In April 2016, Google updated its Search app on Android to feature "Trends"; search queries gaining popularity appeared in the autocomplete box along with normal query autocompletion.[106] The update received significant backlash, due to encouraging search queries unrelated to users' interests or intentions, prompting the company to issue an update with an opt-out option.[107] In September 2017, the Google Search app on iOS was updated to feature the same functionality.[108]

In December 2017, Google released "Google Go", an app designed to enable use of Google Search on physically smaller and lower-spec devices in multiple languages. A Google blog post about designing "India-first" products and features explains that it is "tailor-made for the millions of people in [India and Indonesia] coming online for the first time".[109]

[edit]
A definition link is provided for many search terms.

Google Search consists of a series of localized websites. The largest of those, the google.com site, is the top most-visited website in the world.[110] Some of its features include a definition link for most searches including dictionary words, the number of results you got on your search, links to other searches (e.g. for words that Google believes to be misspelled, it provides a link to the search results using its proposed spelling), the ability to filter results to a date range,[111] and many more.

Search syntax

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Google search accepts queries as normal text, as well as individual keywords.[112] It automatically corrects apparent misspellings by default (while offering to use the original spelling as a selectable alternative), and provides the same results regardless of capitalization.[112] For more customized results, one can use a wide variety of operators, including, but not limited to:[113][114]

  • OR or | – Search for webpages containing one of two similar queries, such as marathon OR race
  • AND – Search for webpages containing two similar queries, such as marathon AND runner
  • - (minus sign) – Exclude a word or a phrase, so that "apple -tree" searches where word "tree" is not used
  • "" – Force inclusion of a word or a phrase, such as "tallest building"
  • * – Placeholder symbol allowing for any substitute words in the context of the query, such as "largest * in the world"
  • .. – Search within a range of numbers, such as "camera $50..$100"
  • site: – Search within a specific website, such as "site:youtube.com"
  • define: – Search for definitions for a word or phrase, such as "define:phrase"
  • stocks: – See the stock price of investments, such as "stocks:googl"
  • related: – Find web pages related to specific URL addresses, such as "related:www.wikipedia.org"
  • cache: – Highlights the search-words within the cached pages, so that "cache:www.google.com xxx" shows cached content with word "xxx" highlighted.
  • ( ) – Group operators and searches, such as (marathon OR race) AND shoes
  • filetype: or ext: – Search for specific file types, such as filetype:gif
  • before: – Search for before a specific date, such as spacex before:2020-08-11
  • after: – Search for after a specific date, such as iphone after:2007-06-29
  • @ – Search for a specific word on social media networks, such as "@twitter"

Google also offers a Google Advanced Search page with a web interface to access the advanced features without needing to remember the special operators.[115]

Query expansion

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Google applies query expansion to submitted search queries, using techniques to deliver results that it considers "smarter" than the query users actually submitted. This technique involves several steps, including:[116]

  • Word stemming – Certain words can be reduced so other, similar terms, are also found in results, so that "translator" can also search for "translation"
  • Acronyms – Searching for abbreviations can also return results about the name in its full length, so that "NATO" can show results for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization"
  • Misspellings – Google will often suggest correct spellings for misspelled words
  • Synonyms – In most cases where a word is incorrectly used in a phrase or sentence, Google search will show results based on the correct synonym
  • Translations – The search engine can, in some instances, suggest results for specific words in a different language
  • Ignoring words – In some search queries containing extraneous or insignificant words, Google search will simply drop those specific words from the query
A screenshot of suggestions by Google Search when "wikip" is typed

In 2008, Google started to give users autocompleted search suggestions in a list below the search bar while typing, originally with the approximate result count previewed for each listed search suggestion.[117]

"I'm Feeling Lucky"

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Google's homepage includes a button labeled "I'm Feeling Lucky". This feature originally allowed users to type in their search query, click the button and be taken directly to the first result, bypassing the search results page. Clicking it while leaving the search box empty opens Google's archive of Doodles.[118] With the 2010 announcement of Google Instant, an automatic feature that immediately displays relevant results as users are typing in their query, the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button disappears, requiring that users opt-out of Instant results through search settings to keep using the "I'm Feeling Lucky" functionality.[119] In 2012, "I'm Feeling Lucky" was changed to serve as an advertisement for Google services; users hover their computer mouse over the button, it spins and shows an emotion ("I'm Feeling Puzzled" or "I'm Feeling Trendy", for instance), and, when clicked, takes users to a Google service related to that emotion.[120]

Tom Chavez of "Rapt", a firm helping to determine a website's advertising worth, estimated in 2007 that Google lost $110 million in revenue per year due to use of the button, which bypasses the advertisements found on the search results page.[121]

Special interactive features

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Besides the main text-based search-engine function of Google search, it also offers multiple quick, interactive features. These include, but are not limited to:[122][123][124]

  • Calculator
  • Time zone, currency, and unit conversions
  • Word translations
  • Flight status
  • Local film showings
  • Weather forecasts
  • Population and unemployment rates
  • Package tracking
  • Word definitions
  • Metronome
  • Roll a die
  • "Do a barrel roll" (search page spins)
  • "Askew" (results show up sideways)
[edit]

During Google's developer conference, Google I/O, in May 2013, the company announced that users on Google Chrome and ChromeOS would be able to have the browser initiate an audio-based search by saying "OK Google", with no button presses required. After having the answer presented, users can follow up with additional, contextual questions; an example include initially asking "OK Google, will it be sunny in Santa Cruz this weekend?", hearing a spoken answer, and reply with "how far is it from here?"[125][126] An update to the Chrome browser with voice-search functionality rolled out a week later, though it required a button press on a microphone icon rather than "OK Google" voice activation.[127] Google released a browser extension for the Chrome browser, named with a "beta" tag for unfinished development, shortly thereafter.[128] In May 2014, the company officially added "OK Google" into the browser itself;[129] they removed it in October 2015, citing low usage, though the microphone icon for activation remained available.[130] In May 2016, 20% of search queries on mobile devices were done through voice.[131]

Operations

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Search products

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Google Videos
Screenshot
Google Videos homepage as of 2016
Type of site
Video search engine
Available in Multilingual
Owner Google
URL www.google.com/videohp
Commercial Yes
Registration Recommended
Launched August 20, 2012; 12 years ago (2012-08-20)

In addition to its tool for searching web pages, Google also provides services for searching images, Usenet newsgroups, news websites, videos (Google Videos), searching by locality, maps, and items for sale online. Google Videos allows searching the World Wide Web for video clips.[132] The service evolved from Google Video, Google's discontinued video hosting service that also allowed to search the web for video clips.[132]

In 2012, Google has indexed over 30 trillion web pages, and received 100 billion queries per month.[133] It also caches much of the content that it indexes. Google operates other tools and services including Google News, Google Shopping, Google Maps, Google Custom Search, Google Earth, Google Docs, Picasa (discontinued), Panoramio (discontinued), YouTube, Google Translate, Google Blog Search and Google Desktop Search (discontinued[134]).

There are also products available from Google that are not directly search-related. Gmail, for example, is a webmail application, but still includes search features; Google Browser Sync does not offer any search facilities, although it aims to organize your browsing time.

Energy consumption

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In 2009, Google claimed that a search query requires altogether about 1 kJ or 0.0003 kW·h,[135] which is enough to raise the temperature of one liter of water by 0.24 °C. According to green search engine Ecosia, the industry standard for search engines is estimated to be about 0.2 grams of CO2 emission per search.[136] Google's 40,000 searches per second translate to 8 kg CO2 per second or over 252 million kilos of CO2 per year.[137]

Google Doodles

[edit]

On certain occasions, the logo on Google's webpage will change to a special version, known as a "Google Doodle". This is a picture, drawing, animation, or interactive game that includes the logo. It is usually done for a special event or day although not all of them are well known.[138] Clicking on the Doodle links to a string of Google search results about the topic. The first was a reference to the Burning Man Festival in 1998,[139][140] and others have been produced for the birthdays of notable people like Albert Einstein, historical events like the interlocking Lego block's 50th anniversary and holidays like Valentine's Day.[141] Some Google Doodles have interactivity beyond a simple search, such as the famous "Google Pac-Man" version that appeared on May 21, 2010.

Criticism

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Privacy

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Google has been criticized for placing long-term cookies on users' machines to store preferences, a tactic which also enables them to track a user's search terms and retain the data for more than a year.[142]

Since 2012, Google Inc. has globally introduced encrypted connections for most of its clients, to bypass governative blockings of the commercial and IT services.[143]

Complaints about indexing

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In 2003, The New York Times complained about Google's indexing, claiming that Google's caching of content on its site infringed its copyright for the content.[144] In both Field v. Google and Parker v. Google, the United States District Court of Nevada ruled in favor of Google.[145][146]

Child sexual abuse

[edit]

A 2019 New York Times article on Google Search showed that images of child sexual abuse had been found on Google and that the company had been reluctant at times to remove them.[147]

January 2009 malware bug

[edit]
A screenshot of the error of January 31, 2009

Google flags search results with the message "This site may harm your computer" if the site is known to install malicious software in the background or otherwise surreptitiously. For approximately 40 minutes on January 31, 2009, all search results were mistakenly classified as malware and could therefore not be clicked; instead a warning message was displayed and the user was required to enter the requested URL manually. The bug was caused by human error.[148][149][150][151] The URL of "/" (which expands to all URLs) was mistakenly added to the malware patterns file.[149][150]

Possible misuse of search results

[edit]

In 2007, a group of researchers observed a tendency for users to rely exclusively on Google Search for finding information, writing that "With the Google interface the user gets the impression that the search results imply a kind of totality. ... In fact, one only sees a small part of what one could see if one also integrates other research tools."[152]

In 2011, Google Search query results have been shown by Internet activist Eli Pariser to be tailored to users, effectively isolating users in what he defined as a filter bubble. Pariser holds algorithms used in search engines such as Google Search responsible for catering "a personal ecosystem of information".[153] Although contrasting views have mitigated the potential threat of "informational dystopia" and questioned the scientific nature of Pariser's claims,[154] filter bubbles have been mentioned to account for the surprising results of the U.S. presidential election in 2016 alongside fake news and echo chambers, suggesting that Facebook and Google have designed personalized online realities in which "we only see and hear what we like".[155]

FTC fines

[edit]

In 2012, the US Federal Trade Commission fined Google US$22.5 million for violating their agreement not to violate the privacy of users of Apple's Safari web browser.[156] The FTC was also continuing to investigate if Google's favoring of their own services in their search results violated antitrust regulations.[157]

Payments to Apple

[edit]

In a November 2023 disclosure, during the ongoing antitrust trial against Google, an economics professor at the University of Chicago revealed that Google pays Apple 36% of all search advertising revenue generated when users access Google through the Safari browser. This revelation reportedly caused Google's lead attorney to cringe visibly.[citation needed] The revenue generated from Safari users has been kept confidential, but the 36% figure suggests that it is likely in the tens of billions of dollars.

Both Apple and Google have argued that disclosing the specific terms of their search default agreement would harm their competitive positions. However, the court ruled that the information was relevant to the antitrust case and ordered its disclosure. This revelation has raised concerns about the dominance of Google in the search engine market and the potential anticompetitive effects of its agreements with Apple.[158]

Big data and human bias

[edit]

Google search engine robots are programmed to use algorithms that understand and predict human behavior. The book, Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code[159] by Ruha Benjamin talks about human bias as a behavior that the Google search engine can recognize. In 2016, some users Google searched "three Black teenagers" and images of criminal mugshots of young African American teenagers came up. Then, the users searched "three White teenagers" and were presented with photos of smiling, happy teenagers. They also searched for "three Asian teenagers", and very revealing photos of Asian girls and women appeared. Benjamin concluded that these results reflect human prejudice and views on different ethnic groups. A group of analysts explained the concept of a racist computer program: "The idea here is that computers, unlike people, can't be racist but we're increasingly learning that they do in fact take after their makers ... Some experts believe that this problem might stem from the hidden biases in the massive piles of data that the algorithms process as they learn to recognize patterns ... reproducing our worst values".[159]

Monopoly ruling

[edit]

On August 5, 2024, Google lost a lawsuit which started in 2020 in D.C. Circuit Court, with Judge Amit Mehta finding that the company had an illegal monopoly over Internet search.[160] This monopoly was held to be in violation of Section 2 of the Sherman Act.[161] Google has said it will appeal the ruling[162], though they did propose to loosen search deals with Apple and others requiring them to set Google as the default search engine.[163]

Trademark

[edit]

As people talk about "googling" rather than searching, the company has taken some steps to defend its trademark, in an effort to prevent it from becoming a generic trademark.[164][165] This has led to lawsuits, threats of lawsuits, and the use of euphemisms, such as calling Google Search a famous web search engine.[166]

Discontinued features

[edit]

Translate foreign pages

[edit]

Until May 2013, Google Search had offered a feature to translate search queries into other languages. A Google spokesperson told Search Engine Land that "Removing features is always tough, but we do think very hard about each decision and its implications for our users. Unfortunately, this feature never saw much pick up".[167]

[edit]

Instant search was announced in September 2010 as a feature that displayed suggested results while the user typed in their search query, initially only in select countries or to registered users.[168] The primary advantage of the new system was its ability to save time, with Marissa Mayer, then-vice president of search products and user experience, proclaiming that the feature would save 2–5 seconds per search, elaborating that "That may not seem like a lot at first, but it adds up. With Google Instant, we estimate that we'll save our users 11 hours with each passing second!"[169] Matt Van Wagner of Search Engine Land wrote that "Personally, I kind of like Google Instant and I think it represents a natural evolution in the way search works", and also praised Google's efforts in public relations, writing that "With just a press conference and a few well-placed interviews, Google has parlayed this relatively minor speed improvement into an attention-grabbing front-page news story".[170] The upgrade also became notable for the company switching Google Search's underlying technology from HTML to AJAX.[171]

Instant Search could be disabled via Google's "preferences" menu for those who didn't want its functionality.[172]

The publication 2600: The Hacker Quarterly compiled a list of words that Google Instant did not show suggested results for, with a Google spokesperson giving the following statement to Mashable:[173]

There are several reasons you may not be seeing search queries for a particular topic. Among other things, we apply a narrow set of removal policies for pornography, violence, and hate speech. It's important to note that removing queries from Autocomplete is a hard problem, and not as simple as blacklisting particular terms and phrases.

In search, we get more than one billion searches each day. Because of this, we take an algorithmic approach to removals, and just like our search algorithms, these are imperfect. We will continue to work to improve our approach to removals in Autocomplete, and are listening carefully to feedback from our users.

Our algorithms look not only at specific words, but compound queries based on those words, and across all languages. So, for example, if there's a bad word in Russian, we may remove a compound word including the transliteration of the Russian word into English. We also look at the search results themselves for given queries. So, for example, if the results for a particular query seem pornographic, our algorithms may remove that query from Autocomplete, even if the query itself wouldn't otherwise violate our policies. This system is neither perfect nor instantaneous, and we will continue to work to make it better.

PC Magazine discussed the inconsistency in how some forms of the same topic are allowed; for instance, "lesbian" was blocked, while "gay" was not, and "cocaine" was blocked, while "crack" and "heroin" were not. The report further stated that seemingly normal words were also blocked due to pornographic innuendos, most notably "scat", likely due to having two completely separate contextual meanings, one for music and one for a sexual practice.[174]

On July 26, 2017, Google removed Instant results, due to a growing number of searches on mobile devices, where interaction with search, as well as screen sizes, differ significantly from a computer.[175][176]

 

Instant previews[edit]

"Instant previews" allowed previewing screenshots of search results' web pages without having to open them. The feature was introduced in November 2010 to the desktop website and removed in April 2013 citing low usage.[177][178]

Dedicated encrypted search page

[edit]

Various search engines provide encrypted Web search facilities. In May 2010 Google rolled out SSL-encrypted web search.[179] The encrypted search was accessed at encrypted.google.com[180] However, the web search is encrypted via Transport Layer Security (TLS) by default today, thus every search request should be automatically encrypted if TLS is supported by the web browser.[181] On its support website, Google announced that the address encrypted.google.com would be turned off April 30, 2018, stating that all Google products and most new browsers use HTTPS connections as the reason for the discontinuation.[182]

[edit]

Google Real-Time Search was a feature of Google Search in which search results also sometimes included real-time information from sources such as Twitter, Facebook, blogs, and news websites.[183] The feature was introduced on December 7, 2009,[184] and went offline on July 2, 2011, after the deal with Twitter expired.[185] Real-Time Search included Facebook status updates beginning on February 24, 2010.[186] A feature similar to Real-Time Search was already available on Microsoft's Bing search engine, which showed results from Twitter and Facebook.[187] The interface for the engine showed a live, descending "river" of posts in the main region (which could be paused or resumed), while a bar chart metric of the frequency of posts containing a certain search term or hashtag was located on the right hand corner of the page above a list of most frequently reposted posts and outgoing links. Hashtag search links were also supported, as were "promoted" tweets hosted by Twitter (located persistently on top of the river) and thumbnails of retweeted image or video links.

In January 2011, geolocation links of posts were made available alongside results in Real-Time Search. In addition, posts containing syndicated or attached shortened links were made searchable by the link: query option. In July 2011, Real-Time Search became inaccessible, with the Real-Time link in the Google sidebar disappearing and a custom 404 error page generated by Google returned at its former URL. Google originally suggested that the interruption was temporary and related to the launch of Google+;[188] they subsequently announced that it was due to the expiry of a commercial arrangement with Twitter to provide access to tweets.[189]

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Further reading

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Frequently Asked Questions

The cost of our web design services depends on several factors such as the complexity of the site, special features needed, time frame etc. Therefore we dont have standard pricing but we can provide an estimate once we understand your requirements better.
Some of the top-rated web design agencies in Sydney include G Squared, Digital Garden, The Website Marketing Group (TWMG), and Magicdust.
These companies are known for their innovative designs, customised services catering to various industries, efficient project management and execution, high client satisfaction rates and positive reviews.
These agencies typically cater to a wide range of clients from different sectors including retail, finance, hospitality, technology among others. They offer services to both small businesses and larger corporate entities.
You can visit their websites directly for more information on their services. Most have contact forms where you can detail your needs or provide your contact details for them to get back to you. Alternatively, some also provide direct email addresses or phone numbers you can use to initiate communication.
The cost of web design services in Sydney can vary greatly depending on the complexity and size of the project. On average, it ranges from AUD$2,000 to AUD$10,000 for small to medium-sized businesses.
Yes, there are ongoing costs involved in maintaining a website such as hosting fees, domain name renewal, software updates, content changes and security measures that can range between AUD$50 to AUD$200 per month based on your service provider and plan.
Yes, many web designers in Sydney offer package deals which include both designing the website and providing ongoing maintenance services. These packages often prove more economical over time than individual services.
You should consider factors like experience, portfolio quality, client reviews/testimonials, pricing transparency and post-completion support when choosing a reliable web design agency. Its also recommended to have an initial consultation to ensure they understand your business needs and expectations.
Most Sydney web design companies provide services such as website design and development, mobile app development, eCommerce solutions, UX/UI design, search engine optimization (SEO), digital marketing strategies, content management systems (CMS), web hosting and maintenance.
Yes. Many Sydney-based web design companies offer tailored website designs to meet the specific needs and brand identity of each business or individual.
These companies use various strategies like keyword research & optimization, creating high-quality content, ensuring fast loading speed, making websites mobile-friendly, and implementing meta tags & descriptions to make sure that the websites they build perform well on search engines.
Absolutely. Numerous Sydney web design firms specialize in developing eCommerce websites with features like shopping carts, secure payment gateways, product catalogue management etc.
Most Sydney web design firms provide ongoing technical support that includes site maintenance for bug fixes or updates as well as potential future redesigns. They may also provide analytics reports to help understand user behavior on your site.
Website developers in Sydney typically offer an array of services including custom web design, web development, eCommerce solutions, digital marketing strategies, SEO optimization, and mobile app development. They can also provide regular site maintenance and user experience testing.
The cost of hiring a website developer in Sydney can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the project. A simple website could cost around $2,000-$5,000 AUD while more complex sites will be considerably more expensive. Its best to get a quote directly from the web design company for accurate pricing.
The timeline for developing a new site depends on several factors including complexity of the design, number of pages, custom features required etc. Generally it could take anywhere between 4-12 weeks to build a functional and visually pleasing website. However, this timeline is flexible based on client needs and feedback.
Creative web design involves more than just coding and layout. Its about combining aesthetic elements with functionality to create an engaging, interactive, and user-friendly website.
A creative website not only looks good but also provides an immersive experience for users. This can increase engagement, improve brand perception, and make your business stand out from competition.
Yes, weve worked on several projects where we were able to showcase our creativity. Wed be happy to share our portfolio with you to give you a better understanding of what we can do.
The process starts with understanding your goals and target audience. Then we brainstorm and come up with unique ideas that align with these goals, followed by wireframing, prototyping, testing and finally launching the site.
The cost will depend on many factors such as complexity of the design, number of pages needed, special features required etc. We will discuss all these details to provide an accurate quote before starting any work.
You should consider factors such as the agencys portfolio, customer reviews, cost of service, and their understanding of your industry. Its also crucial to ensure they are local to Sydney if face-to-face meetings are important to you.
The price can vary depending on the complexity of the design and functionality required. On average, small businesses might expect to pay anywhere from $2,000 - $10,000 AUD.
Typically, designing and launching a basic website takes around 6-8 weeks. However, more complex sites may require several months.
Yes, many web design agencies also offer SEO services. It is beneficial to hire an agency that understands SEO best practices as this will help your site rank higher on search engines.
A professionally designed website helps establish credibility with customers and sets you apart from competitors. It can also improve user experience which can lead to increased sales and customer loyalty.
Affordable web design in Sydney typically involves services that provide good value for money, including responsive design, SEO optimization, and ongoing support without the high costs associated with large agencies.
The cost of affordable web design can vary significantly depending on the complexity of your website. However, it generally ranges from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars.
Yes, many affordable web designers are highly skilled professionals who are capable of creating high-quality and visually appealing websites. The key is to find a designer or agency that provides great value for their pricing.
Yes, there are numerous reputable and reliable companies offering affordable web designs services such as Five by Five, Magicdust and Webcoda. Its essential to research reviews and portfolios before making a decision.
A well-designed website should be scalable and adaptable with your business growth. Before hiring a designer or agency, ensure they have plans for potential future adjustments or expansions needed for your site.
Responsive web design is an approach to designing websites so that they look and function well on various devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. It involves using flexible layouts, images and CSS media queries.
With an increasing number of people accessing the internet via mobile devices, having a website that works well on these devices is critical. If your website doesnt display properly or isnt user-friendly on mobile devices, you could lose potential customers. Additionally, Google ranks mobile-friendly websites higher in search results.
You can research online to find agencies specializing in responsive web design in Sydney. Look at their portfolios to see examples of their work. Check reviews and testimonials from past clients. Also consider meeting with several agencies before making your final decision.
Custom web design involves creating a website from scratch, tailored to the specific needs and preferences of a business or individual. Its not based on templates or pre-set layouts, but designed uniquely to reflect your brand identity.
Custom web designs offer more flexibility in terms of layout and functionality. They can better represent your brand and help you stand out from competitors. Although initially more expensive than template-based designs, they are easier to update and scale with your business over time.
Absolutely! A reputable Sydney-based web designer would always welcome client input during every stage of the process from initial concepts, revisions up until the final product.
The cost can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the site, features needed, and ongoing maintenance requirements. However, on average, custom websites could range anywhere between $2000 - $10,000 AUD or higher. Always check with your chosen agency for an accurate quote.
Architect web design in Sydney often reflects the citys modern yet timeless aesthetic, combining functionality with an appealing visual layout. It usually incorporates elements that represent Sydneys architectural landscape.
Some leading firms offering architect web design services include G Squared, WebFX, and Magicdust. Each has a strong reputation for creating effective and visually pleasing websites for architecture firms.
The cost can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the project, but generally, it can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Most agencies will provide a quote after discussing specific needs and requirements.
The timeline for completing an architect website design can vary based on several factors such as complexity of the project, size of the website and responsiveness of client feedback. Generally speaking, a basic website could take anywhere from few weeks to a couple of months.
The cost varies based on different factors such as complexity of design, number of pages needed, special features required etc. After discussing your specific needs, we can provide you with a detailed quote.
Weve worked with numerous landscaping companies in Sydney and understand the specific needs and aesthetics that appeal to their target audience.
Our team employs innovative design strategies tailored to your unique brand, ensuring that your site not only looks great but performs well too. We will focus on showcasing your services, previous work, and customer testimonials to make sure it stands out.
We offer various maintenance packages which include regular updates or changes you want to implement. Additionally, we believe in empowering our clients; hence we create user-friendly interfaces that allow minor changes without needing extensive technical knowledge.
Absolutely! We integrate SEO strategies into our web design process to enhance visibility on search engines like Google. This includes keyword optimization, mobile-friendly design, fast loading times and quality content creation.
Key features to include would be a portfolio of past projects, detailed descriptions of services offered, customer testimonials, an easy-to-use contact form, and clear, visible branding.
SEO can be optimized by using relevant keywords such as Pergola Builders Sydney, Patio Construction Sydney, etc., providing quality content on the site that provides value to readers, and ensuring that the website is mobile-friendly.
A visually appealing website could feature high-quality images of previous work, use colors that complement the companys brand image, have an uncluttered layout with clear navigation menus, and incorporate modern design elements.
The contact information should be clearly visible on every page preferably at the top or bottom. It can also have its own dedicated Contact Us page with details like phone number, email address, physical address (if applicable), operating hours and possibly an embedded map location.
The content should include detailed services pages explaining what kind of work they do (pergolas versus patios), about us page highlighting their experience and expertise in the field. Additionally blog posts or articles giving tips on maintaining or choosing designs for patios or pergolas could add extra value.
When designing your tradies website, consider various elements such as the user interface and experience, mobile compatibility, SEO optimization for local searches (like Tradies in Sydney), easy navigation, fast loading speed and clear call-to-action buttons. It is also essential that your site includes detailed service descriptions and contact information.
A professional web designer understands the specific strategies needed to optimize your website for search engines, enhance its performance and make it visually appealing. They can ensure your website is designed with SEO best practices which will increase visibility online. Also, they can implement features such as an online booking system or quote request form which would streamline customer interaction.
A professionally designed website helps establish credibility and trust among potential clients. It serves as a digital storefront where customers can learn more about services offered. With the competitive nature of the trades industry in Sydney, having a well-designed, functional and user-friendly website gives you an edge over competitors who may not be as digitally savvy.
We have extensive experience designing websites across various industries, including home painting services. We understand the specific requirements and marketplace of such businesses, ensuring we create a site that is both functional and appealing to your target audience.
By prioritizing customized design, SEO optimization, user-friendly interface and incorporating unique features specific to your business needs, we ensure your website not only stands out but also ranks high on search engine results.
Our priority is to meet our clients satisfaction. Therefore, we incorporate constant communication throughout the project development process where clients can give input on content and design. We provide recommendations but ultimately respect and implement client decisions.
Absolutely! Our web designing service includes comprehensive SEO strategies that are specifically tailored toward attracting more local traffic from Sydney residents looking for home painting services.
The time frame can depend on many factors including complexity of design, any special features required etc., however generally speaking it can take anywhere between 6-8 weeks to develop a fully functioning website.
Some of the top-rated web design companies in Sydney include G Squared, Digital Garden, and Magicdust.
These web designers typically offer a range of services including website design & development, eCommerce solutions, digital marketing strategies, SEO optimization, social media management and content creation.
The cost can vary greatly depending on the scope and complexity of the project. For a simple website design, prices may start around $1000 AUD while more complex projects could easily reach over $10,000 AUD. Its best to contact each company directly for a specific quote based on your needs.
You can find professional web designers in Sydney through various online platforms such as Upwork, Freelancer, or LinkedIn. Also, local networking events or business directories can be useful.
Yes, there are numerous well-regarded agencies such as Digital Garden, G Squared and Magicdust offering web design services in Sydney.
When hiring a web designer or agency, consider their portfolio to assess if they match your style preference, their reviews and testimonials for credibility check, pricing structure for budget compatibility and whether they offer post-launch website support/maintenance.
The cost of hiring a web designer can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the project. On average though, you might expect to pay anywhere between AUD $2,000 - $5,000 for basic website designs from freelancers whereas established agencies may charge higher rates starting from AUD $10,000 upwards.
The cost can vary greatly depending on several factors including the complexity of the project, the designers experience and skills, and their location. In Sydney, an average project could range anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000 AUD.
Both methods are common. Some freelancers charge by the hour which can range from $50 to $200 AUD per hour depending on their level of expertise. Others prefer to charge a flat rate per project which takes into account all aspects of the work involved.
Yes, most freelancers are open to negotiation as long as it reflects fair compensation for their time and effort. However, remember that lower prices may also mean compromises on quality or timeliness.
There may be additional costs such as hosting fees, domain registration, content creation (if not provided), SEO services etc. Its important to clarify these aspects before starting a project to avoid unexpected expenses later.
A freelance web designer in Sydney should have a strong understanding of graphic design, user experience (UX), user interface (UI) design, HTML/CSS coding, JavaScript, and SEO. They should also be familiar with web design tools like Adobe Creative Suite and WordPress.
Its extremely important. With the increasing use of smartphones and tablets to browse the internet, having a website that is mobile responsive can significantly improve user experience and engagement.
Yes, being able to work with various CMS platforms such as WordPress, Joomla or Drupal is crucial as these systems are commonly used for website creation and management. This gives clients more control over their websites once the project is complete.
Very relevant. A good freelancer doesnt just create visually appealing websites; they also need to ensure that those sites are optimized for search engines. An understanding of SEO best practices can significantly enhance the visibility of a clients website on Google.
Successful freelancers require excellent written and verbal communication skills. They need to understand their client’s needs and expectations clearly and translate those into an effective visual solution. Good communication also helps when explaining technical aspects to non-technical clients.
Some of the latest trends include Progressive Web Apps (PWA), Artificial Intelligence and Bots, Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), Single Page Applications (SPA), and API-first design.
AI is being used for creating intelligent chatbots for customer service, improving user experience through personalized content, predictive analytics, and automating routine tasks.
AMP helps to improve the performance of mobile web pages, making them load faster. This improves user engagement and contributes to higher search engine rankings.
SPAs provide a smoother user experience by eliminating the need for page reloads. They are becoming popular for building responsive websites and mobile applications.
API-first design means building your application based on the API, ensuring that all applications using this API have a consistent experience. It allows developers to work on multiple platforms simultaneously, increasing efficiency and coherence.
The latest web design trends have a significant impact on local businesses in Sydney. It influences how they present themselves online, their customer engagement and ultimately their sales.
Responsive web design plays a crucial role as it ensures that websites function seamlessly across all devices. That increases accessibility for customers, which can lead to higher traffic and potentially more sales for local businesses.
Advancements in SEO practices greatly increase the visibility of local businesses online. By optimizing website content, using relevant keywords and improving site speed, these businesses can rank higher on search engine results thereby reaching a wider audience.
Yes, having an updated and professional website design significantly influences consumer trust. A well-designed website signifies that the business is credible, modern, and cares about its consumers experience.
Incorporating e-commerce features can indeed boost sales for SMEs. This allows them to sell products directly from their websites, making shopping easier for customers while also expanding the potential market beyond just Sydney.
Sydney-based web designers use Local SEO by optimizing a websites content, keywords, and backlinks so it appears at the top of search results within its specific geographic area. They also ensure the business is listed on Google My Business and other local directories to increase visibility.
Local SEO is crucial as it helps businesses reach prospective customers in their vicinity. It increases online visibility and organic traffic from users searching within that location. This can be particularly beneficial for businesses serving a specific area like Sydney.
Techniques utilized include creating locally relevant content, using local keywords, ensuring the site is mobile-friendly, improving page loading speed, having consistent NAP (Name, Address, Phone number) across all platforms, and getting positive reviews on Google My Business.
Yes. While they specialize in optimizing websites for local searches in Sydney, these skills are transferable. A competent web designer can adapt their strategy to optimize a website for any geographical location based on the clients needs.
Website optimization services involve various strategies to improve a websites performance, accessibility, and visibility. These can include improving site speed, ensuring mobile-friendliness, optimizing for search engines (SEO), enhancing user experience (UX), and more.
Website optimization makes your site more visible on search engines like Google which means more traffic and potential customers. It also improves user experience which can lead to higher conversion rates. Whether youre targeting audiences in Sydney or globally, an optimized website can significantly enhance your online presence.
There are many reputable companies providing web design and optimization services in Sydney such as Webski Solutions, Magicdust, G Squared & Whitehat Agency etc. The choice depends on your specific needs, budget and business goals. Always look for a service provider with good reviews, proven results and excellent customer service.
Website optimization is crucial for several reasons. It improves the sites speed, usability, and accessibility, thus enhancing user experience. Moreover, optimized websites rank higher on search engine results which increases visibility and attracts more potential customers.
Website optimization significantly enhances your websites performance by reducing loading times, ensuring it displays correctly across various devices (desktops, mobiles, tablets), and making it easier for search engines to understand your content.
Key elements include responsive design (ensuring the site looks good on all devices), improving site speed (by optimizing images and code), SEO-friendly URLs and meta tags, as well as creating quality content that includes relevant keywords.
Web Design Sydney provides comprehensive services including SEO audits to identify areas of improvement, optimizing HTML codes for faster loading times, creating responsive designs for better mobile viewing experience, developing SEO-friendly URLs and meta tags to improve ranking on search engines like Google. They also offer content creation with targeted keywords that can draw more traffic to your site.
The firms generally offer services such as Search Engine Optimization (SEO), website speed optimization, conversion rate optimization and content optimization among others.
These services can improve your websites visibility on search engines like Google, enhance user experience by improving loading speed and navigability, and increase the likelihood of visitors becoming customers through strategic content placement and design.
It would be best to contact each firm directly for this information. Most established firms will have portfolios or case studies demonstrating their past work that they can share with you.
Optimization can significantly improve the speed and responsiveness of a website. It involves reducing file sizes, minimizing code, optimizing images, using efficient loading techniques such as lazy loading and implementing proper caching strategies. These all contribute to faster page load times which provides a better user experience.
Website performance is crucial in any location including Sydney because it directly impacts user experience and SEO rankings. A well-optimized website will load quickly, keep visitors engaged longer and rank higher on search engine result pages leading to increased visibility and potentially more business opportunities.
Some common techniques include minifying CSS, JS, and HTML files; compressing images without losing quality; leveraging browser caching; minimizing HTTP requests by combining files; using content delivery networks (CDNs) to deliver resources faster to users based on their geographical location; utilizing GZIP compression for smaller file size during transfer; enabling deferred JavaScript loading.
Optimizing a website doesnt necessarily mean compromising on its aesthetics or functionality. Instead, its about making smart choices regarding file types, sizes, coding techniques etc., that enhance both appearance and performance. For instance, you can use SVGs instead of bitmap images where appropriate as they scale better while maintaining a smaller file size.