Meta Information

<META>

The <META> tag is used to convey meta-information about the document, but can also be used to specify headers for the document. You can use either HTTP-EQUIV= or NAME= attributes to name the meta-information, but CONTENT= must be used in both cases. By using HTTP-EQUIV, a server should use the name indicated as a header, with the specified CONTENT as its value.

• NAME=
  This attribute is used to define the name of the meta element.

• HTTP-EQUIV=
  Same use as name, but the element will result in creating header information for the HTML document.

• CONTENT=
  Content is used with both NAME= and HTTP-EQUIV= to define the content of the meta element.

The following uses of the META tag are now strongly recommended for all Library of Congress HTML pages:

<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="keyword, another keyword, third keyword, ...">

Identifies keywords for search engines such as Infoseek or Alta Vista. These are added to the keywords found in the document itself. If you insert a keyword more than seven times here, the whole tag will be ignored! For keywords made up of one or more words, use commas to separate each concept.

<META NAME="description" CONTENT="This is a site ...">

Search engines which support the above tag will now display the text you specify here, rather than the first few lines of text from the actual document when the document shows up in a search result. You have about 1,000 characters for your description, but keep the important information up front.

Some examples of the HTTP-EQUIV attribute include:

<META HTTP-EQUIV="refresh" CONTENT="number of seconds" URL="http://www.loc.gov/...">

This is the "meta refresh", which on certain browsers causes the document mentioned in the URL to be loaded after n seconds. This can be used for slide shows or for often-changing information, but has some drawbacks. In particular, if you use a value of zero seconds, the user can no longer go "Back" with his back button. He will be transferred to the specified URL, and when he presses "back" there, he will go back to the document with the refresh, which immediately redirects him to the document he tried to get away from.

<META HTTP-EQUIV="expires" CONTENT="Tue, 20 Aug 1996 14:25:27 GMT">

Indicates that the document containing this META tag will expire at this date. If the document is requested after this date, the browser should load a new copy from the server, instead of using the copy in its cache.

• Web Design Group Reference on Meta Information: http://www.htmlhelp.com/reference/html40/head/meta.html
  
• The Dublin Core (Meta tags under development): http://purl.oclc.org/dc/

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