John Mueller from Google engaged in a LinkedIn discussion addressing the utilization of an unsupported noindex directive within his website’s robots.txt file. He elaborated on the advantages and disadvantages of this directive’s search engine endorsement while shedding light on Google’s internal deliberations concerning its potential support.
Unconventional Directives: Exploring John Mueller’s Robots.txt
The peculiar content of John Mueller’s robots.txt file has sparked discussions over the past week due to its unconventional and non-standard directives. Predictably, Mueller’s robots.txt has attracted attention and gained traction within the search marketing community, becoming a topic of scrutiny and interest.
Unveiling the Noindex Directive: Examining John Mueller’s Robots.txt
In web crawling protocols, everything housed within a robots.txt file is deemed a directive—a set of instructions for web crawlers to follow, provided they adhere to robots.txt guidelines.
However, any directive diverging from these established norms risks being overlooked. A non-standard directive within John Mueller’s robots.txt recently attracted attention, prompting an inquiry on its compatibility with Google’s support.
The particular directive in question was “noindex,” which, while a component of the meta robots standard, doesn’t align with the robots.txt standard. Mueller’s robots.txt contained not just one but a staggering 5,506 instances of the noindex directive.
The query, posed by SEO specialist Mahek Giri to John Mueller via LinkedIn, encapsulated the curiosity surrounding this unconventional inclusion:
“In John Mueller’s robots.txt file, there’s an unusual command: ‘noindex:’ This command isn’t part of the standard robots.txt format. So, do you think it will impact how search engines index his pages? John Mueller is curious to know about noindex: in robots.txt.”
Understanding Why Google Does Not Support the Noindex Directive in Robots.txt
Google’s John Mueller provided a clear response, stating that the noindex directive within robots.txt is unsupported. He elaborated, explaining that Google had once contemplated supporting this directive. The rationale behind supporting the noindex directive stemmed from the potential convenience it would offer publishers, allowing them to prevent crawling and indexing simultaneously.
Currently, publishers can block crawling in robots.txt or prevent indexing using the meta robots noindex directive. However, combining both actions—blocking indexing with meta robots and crawling in robots.txt—is problematic. A block on crawling would prevent the crawler from detecting the metarobot directive.
Mueller delved into why Google ultimately decided against supporting the noindex directive within robots.txt. He elucidated that although there were discussions about its potential inclusion in the robots.txt standard, concerns arose regarding the accidental removal of critical website components due to the ease of copying and pasting robots.txt files without careful examination. Consequently, it was determined over a decade ago that the noindex directive should not be supported or integrated into the robots.txt standard.
Unveiling the Mystery Behind Noindex in Mueller’s Robots.txt
John Mueller emphasized the improbability of Google endorsing the noindex tag within robots.txt; a stance solidified approximately a decade ago. While the disclosure of internal deliberations adds intrigue, it further amplifies the enigmatic nature of Mueller’s robots.txt file.
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