Google Sitemap Resources

February 6, 2006 —

Google recently implemented a program called Sitemaps that lets any site developer publish a map of their site and submit it to Google for indexing. It's designed to let companies guide Google's crawlers and should help get pages indexed more quickly and thoroughly. While Google says that this won't raise your page ranking, it may mean that your site gets more traffic, simply because your pages are more thoroughly indexed.

Because of the influence of search engines, especially Google, on site traffic, many tools and resources have been developed to make it easier to create and work with Sitemaps.

Tools for Sitemaps

Google provides a script that is designed to help site owners create Sitemaps, Sitemap Generator. It's a free Python script, downloadable via Sourceforge (see Resources). Many third-party tools have also emerged to support the creation of Sitemaps, also, including standalone scripts and updates to content management systems.

Content Management Systems

Several content management systems have added Sitemap support. Niall Kennedy has published a Movable Type template that will create a Sitemap. It basically "selects all" within the content database and then outputs a list of URLs with fixed Sitemap priorities. This approach should be easy to implement with any content management system.

Drupal has a free Google Sitemap module that maintains a short change history for nodes in order to better approximate the change frequency. It calculates the relative priority of each node based on node type, number of comments, and promotion. It can optionally submit your sitemap to Google whenever it is changed and can log when your sitemap is downloaded by Google.

The Google Sitemap Generator for WordPress is a plugin for the popular content management system. It comes as a WordPress plugin, so it can be easily activated or deactivated, and has a Web-based interface within WordPress that lets you set priorities, change frequencies, etc. It creates a sitemap for WordPress posts, static pages, categories and archive pages. It can also set priorities for pages based on the number of comments. The Sitemap is rebuilt each time a page is updated or added.

The open source Plone CMS has an option, Google Sitemaps 0.3, that is designed to let Plone-based websites support Sitemaps.

Plugins are also available for OS Commerce, vBulletin, phpBB, ClickCartPro, PHP ECommerce Templates and many other systems.

Standalone Applications

Dreamweaver users can use the Google Sitemap Generator command to create Sitemaps. It integrates a link crawler that generates the sitemap.xml file. It sets priority automatically, based on the number of links to each page.

CoffeeCup Software has an application called SiteMapper that runs on Windows 98, XP, 2000. It crawls your site and creates a Sitemap. It's a commercial product, but a trial version is available.

Micro-Sys has an application, A1 Sitemap Generator, which creates both readable sitemaps and XML Google Sitemaps. It can be run using a script scheduler and has integrated FTP support. It's also a commercial product, and has a 30-day demo version.

SOFTplus GSiteCrawler Google Sitemap Generator is a Windows-based application that can currently be downloaded for free. It crawls websites based on known URLs, or can extract data from server log files. It lets you edit the list of collected URLs, set items to be excluded and set the priority and frequency on a per-URL bases.

Site Map Builder is a freeware Windows generator, built on the .Net framework. It runs on Windows 2000 and higher.

Web-Based Generators

AudiMyPC's Google Sitemap Generator is a free Java based app that supports up to 50,000 pages. It crawls your site based on a starting URL and creates a map of all internal links.

Pingoat sitemap creator generates Sitemaps of your website on the fly. Pingoat can also automatically upload your Sitemap to an FTP server and ping Google. The service crawls your site, returns a list of links that it found, and then lets you either download your Sitemap or FTP it to your site.

TarrantIT Google Sitemap Generator is a free generator service that crawls your site and builds several types of maps, including HTML, text, RSS, and Google versions.

Another Web-based service for creating Sitemaps is SiteMapsPal. It's a free service, but is limited to 2000 links per file.

In addition to these resources, Google has a list of tools available at its developer site.

Google Sitemaps provides a way for sites to ensure that they are thoroughly indexed. This, and the Web-based system Google provides for understanding the indexing of your site, make Sitemaps an important tool for web developers and site owners.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Getting started with Google sitemaps

Sitemap Generator

Sitemaps Third Party Programs & Websites

CoffeeCup Google Sitemapper

A1 Sitemap Generator 1.0

Google Sitemap

Unofficial Google Sitemaps Resource Portal

Pingoat

Plone Google Sitemaps

SOFTplus GSiteCrawler Google Sitemap generator

Site Map Builder

TarrantIT Google Sitemap Generator

Google Sitemaps using Movable Type

SiteMapsPal

AuditMyPC Sitemap Generator - a Java-based app

Google Code: Sitemaps Third Party Programs & Websites

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