Tuesday, March 01, 2005
A cache (pronounced the same as the word cash) is a storage area for computer files. Google maintains an enormous cache of Web pages. Don't confuse the cache with the index. (Actually, for practical purposes, whether you confuse them or not doesn't matter, but they are different.) The index is a database of Web-page content that's stripped of its formatting. The cache contains the pages themselves. By and large, clicking the Cached link that appears under each search result provides a quicker display of the target page because you're getting it from Google's computer instead of the Internet at large.
So why would you ever not use the Cached link instead of the main page title link? Well, the cached page is not necessarily up to the minute, especially with pages that change frequently. If you view the cached version of a page that you know is changed frequently and dated, such as the front page of a newspaper site, you can see that Google's cache is about three days behind. For users without high-speed Internet access, it's more convenient to pull from the cache when looking for a big page (about 50K or so) that doesn't change much
So why would you ever not use the Cached link instead of the main page title link? Well, the cached page is not necessarily up to the minute, especially with pages that change frequently. If you view the cached version of a page that you know is changed frequently and dated, such as the front page of a newspaper site, you can see that Google's cache is about three days behind. For users without high-speed Internet access, it's more convenient to pull from the cache when looking for a big page (about 50K or so) that doesn't change much
