Friday, November 25, 2005
Bloggers frequently comment on each other. Sometimes the comments are nice, sometimes they're not so nice, but they're certainly, uh, involved. Most blogs let visitors leave comments, but the serious discussions are often between two or more blogs, with each containing comments on the other blog. Anyone reading the blog with comments can see the reference to the original blog, but there's no way for someone reading the original to know where to look for comments. That's where trackbacks come in.
Let's say one blogger, call him John (not his real name), posts a provocative entry in his blog. Then a second blogger, Margy (not her real name, either) posts "For an utterly priceless example of garrulity, check out this entry in John's blog" with a link to John's blog. If John's blog software is set up to handle trackbacks, Margy's blog system can tell John's blog about the new link, so John's blog adds a trackback note with a link to the comment, thereby making the connection two-way.
The original vision of hypertext, of which the Web is a quick-and-dirty, hacked-up version, made all links two-way. Trackbacks bring the real-life Web closer to what it was originally supposed to be.
Let's say one blogger, call him John (not his real name), posts a provocative entry in his blog. Then a second blogger, Margy (not her real name, either) posts "For an utterly priceless example of garrulity, check out this entry in John's blog" with a link to John's blog. If John's blog software is set up to handle trackbacks, Margy's blog system can tell John's blog about the new link, so John's blog adds a trackback note with a link to the comment, thereby making the connection two-way.
The original vision of hypertext, of which the Web is a quick-and-dirty, hacked-up version, made all links two-way. Trackbacks bring the real-life Web closer to what it was originally supposed to be.
