Can someone Explain 'Pingbacks' and 'Trackbacks' Please

[Karen Connell]

Can someone please tell me what pingbacks and trackbacks are in idiot proof language?

I've seen this a lot but am not sure if they're good or bad - and it's time I learned what they mean.

Thanks

Karen

[marchenzo]

Hi Karen,

In simple terms, they are there to try and give some validity to where the comments on blogs are orginating from.

Do they work? Discuss lol

[Karen Connell]

So, are they a good thing and do I 'approve' them or not?

And what's the difference between a 'pingback' and a 'trackback'

Thanks

Karen

[marchenzo]

I'm going to PM you a link in a sec that explains it all

[Blaine Moore]

Pingbacks and trackbacks are basically the same thing...

It's an automatic notification sent to a website that the originating page is somehow relevant so that the notified page can include a link back.

The difference between the two is that pingbacks tend to validate that a link exists from the originating page so that it will be a little less susceptible to spam tactics, whereas a trackback just assumes that the originating page is relevant.

In practical use, the two terms are interchangeable.

For my websites, I require a user's first comment to be manually approved before they can post indiscriminately on my website, and since each individual page comes through as their own user it means I need to approve each one.

This means that if it gets past my spam queue, then I'll just check out the link and if it's relevant I'll approve it to appear on my site, and if it's not relevant or is obviously a spam blog then I'll either delete or mark the trackback/pingback as spam as appropriate.

Most blogging software (such as Wordpress) will manage sending and receiving both pingbacks and trackbacks automatically using XML-RPC (basically a behind the scenes way of notifying one another without requiring the full HTML headers being sent back and forth.) Some themes will display received pingbacks/trackbacks as comments, others will display them in their own section of the comments or the sidebar, and others won't display them at all, so it is pretty customizable.

[Karen Connell]

Thank you both - the mud begins to clear!

Karen

[LaptopLivings]

Originally Posted by marchenzo

I'm going to PM you a link in a sec that explains it all

I guess maybe you can't post the actual link here(?), but it would be great if you could maybe copy and paste the actual "explains it all" part of whatever that link leads to, here in the forum for all to see if possible! I'm sure this is a really common question that gets asked a lot.