What is Trackback? (part one)
As part of an (hopefully) ongoing series - here's the most very basic introduction as to what Trackback can do. This is not a study of how it is done - and it makes certain assumptions that I'll go into in an upcoming lesson (assuming I get around to it) - but I think it might be enough to get that basic first point across to people who are confused by all the other stuff it can do...
(Addendum added April 2005: In a later post I came up with this short and pithy description: "When someone links to one of my posts, my post links back to them". I think that's just as useful as the run-through that follows.)
You can also download this image as a .pdf what_is_trackback.pdf. This diagram was created in the awesome OmniGraffle - a product of the Omni Group. I plan to use it loads more from now on...
Addendum: This is not supposed to be directed at the average weblogger of a few months standing. This is just for those newbies who've not managed to see it in context enough or who don't find the name particularly descriptive.
Comments
Please stay on-topic, informative and polite. I reserve the right to remove comments for whatever vague capricious reasons seem reasonable at the time.
...my Mum loves you... ~: )
→ Posted by: s3d at March 31, 2003 5:00 PM
Hmmmnn, not at all condescending. Maybe you could tell us all how hyperlinks work now.
→ Posted by: Reader at March 31, 2003 5:43 PM
The basic functionality of trackback I understand. However, I hate having a (usually empty) trackback link after every post. The way you display your trackbacks is much more elegant. How do you do it?
→ Posted by: Dawn at March 31, 2003 7:56 PM
I don't understand at all
→ Posted by: Dave at March 31, 2003 10:55 PM
Dear "Reader" - if I was writing for a completely non-web-savvy audience, I would explain hyperlinks. In this case, this is designed to be written for a non-blog savvy audience. So there you go.
→ Posted by: Tom Coates at March 31, 2003 11:12 PM
Amazing all this trackback madness lately. You'd think by now we'd all have it, but I guess it is a little complicated.
Someone needs to start a trackback blog or something to show the creative ways people are using the technology, beyond the basics.
→ Posted by: JimmyT at April 1, 2003 12:38 AM
as someone who finally understood what 'trackbacks' were only a few months ago i wish someone had bothered to do something like this when the idea first came out. the name doesn't really help either. 'off site comments' would have told me a lot more than 'trackback' could ever hope to achieve. not quite so snazzy though is it?
there's also the fact that not everyone uses MT or whatever blogging tool that incorperates trackbacks so there's no incentive for some to really get to grips with it.
but while i now understand trackbacks i still fail to see the point of them. instead of having a post with a number of comments that i can follow i now have to follow the trackbacks, which have their own comments, on which the original poster may also have added something to. then once i've finished i have to return to the original page, try and pick up the thread and then go to the next trackbacked link.
i must be *really* missing something here!? sorry to go slightly off topic on the last bit tom.
→ Posted by: pete at April 1, 2003 12:08 PM
I think TrackBack has potential, but only once people realise that its true value lies in the form of 'further reading' or 'see also' type links, rather than just using it as a means of saying..."Oh look, Tom's written another article on his site today..." and blatantly getting a link back to their own site for not a great deal of effort to them or worth to the reader. I like the idea of TrackBack, but won't be bothering following TrackBack URLs if the latter perpetuates.
→ Posted by: s3d at April 1, 2003 1:18 PM
I actually do believe that trackback is one of the most important innovations in the way we use the web (or at least, how we may use it in the future),
The problem is I have a hard time caring enough to install it and make it look like something I would use.
→ Posted by: Choire at April 1, 2003 6:09 PM
So I'm using Phposxom as a blogging system, which does not have trackback and I'm wondering if and how I could use trackback manually?
→ Posted by: Martin Wisse at April 1, 2003 8:06 PM
s3d: i agree. some people seem to see trackbacks as a euphemism for 'increase my google rating'. i've even seen trackbacks where the trackback consisted of a 'look at this' type link or a quoted passage from the original post. surely it's the blog equivalent of spamming comments and chatboxes with 'hey everybody. come visit my site!'. if it was a form of further reading then i think it would be fine. in fact it'd be great. but it's not.
→ Posted by: pete at April 1, 2003 10:11 PM
Martin,
The Moveable Type people have a standalone trackback implementation, which can be adapted for use with Blosxom and variants (incl. PHPosxom):
http://www.movabletype.org/trackback/
I use it with Blosxom, but I'm not familiar with PHPosxom, so I couldn't tell you how to integrate it exactly. You might take a look at some of the work Matt Gemmell has been doing on Thistle (which started life as a variation on PHPosxom).
→ Posted by: Buzz Andersen at April 1, 2003 11:45 PM
RE: Misuse of trackback
Surely people gain a link back to their site simply by including their homepage in the appropriate field? What is the point of putting an additional trackback? Andy
→ Posted by: Andy at April 15, 2004 10:49 PM
Never have I encountered so many dead links in a post... That is just plain unlucky. Love your site though. Thanks.
Nick / SC
→ Posted by: Nick Evil at December 6, 2004 10:57 AM
Andy-
Maybe, say, you don't leave a comment on the "Best Post Ever", however refer to the post on your own blog, maybe even commenting at length on it there- then the trackback would lead people to your site...This is an unprofessional answer from a very much "newbie" blogger :)
→ Posted by: ac at February 21, 2005 12:27 AM
Wow. This was helpful. Old post, but I'm so new. Thanks.
→ Posted by: Ricebowl at April 9, 2005 6:27 PM
Hi and thanks for "What's Trackback, Daddy?". I have posted to my blog for 6 months now and never understood trackbacks. Finally, I get it. I like plasticbag.org.
→ Posted by: Kathy at July 18, 2005 12:35 AM
So I'm using Phposxom as a blogging system, which does not have trackback and I'm wondering if and how I could use trackback manually?
there is an interesting post
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→ Posted by: Claude at August 1, 2005 10:10 PM
I think from a reader's perspective I understand trackbacks, but what I don't understand is how to implement them. It seems like blogspot doesn't support them, so you have to use a third party tool like haloscan for blogspot blogs.
→ Posted by: Knox at September 11, 2005 9:53 PM
Tom, very interesting information, thanks for PDF diagram
→ Posted by: Bruce at November 10, 2005 5:56 PM
I get it now.
→ Posted by: DD at November 29, 2005 5:30 AM
Thanks! Helped me know a lot about Trackbacks!
Way to go. But still a newbie question remains, are trackbacks automatically at the bottom of every post?? Or are they theme dependent.
-Kashmir
→ Posted by: Kashmir at February 3, 2006 3:26 PM
I wish I had read this back when I first started using trackbacks. Then I would not be scrambling trying to add links to my moderated trackbacks!
→ Posted by: Mitchell Allen at March 11, 2006 7:01 AM