Google has teamed up with Adobe to come up with a new algorithm for flash. This new algorithm will enable the Googlebot to index the textual content in SWF files of all kinds along with URLs embedded in Flash. This is indeed a great development, as till date, it has been able to crawl only the (X) HTML architectures without being able to access any text content and URLs in flash. With this new capability, Google can further strengthen its position as the leader in search engines.
The new capability of Google to handle, crawl and index text content in Flash has added a new dimension to its overall service. Google has made use of the Adobe’s new searchable SWF Library to enhance the effectiveness of its new algorithm. However, there is still a lot that remains to be done on this front. As for the time being, this capability is limited to SWF files of all kinds, which include Flash “gadgets” such as buttons or menus, self-contained Flash websites, and everything in between.
According to Ron Adler and Janis Stipins, the software engineers at Google, “If your website contains Flash, the textual content in your Flash files can be used when Google generates a snippet for your website. Also, the words that appear in your Flash files can be used to match query terms in Google searches.” This is however, only one aspect of the story. Google’s new algorithm is also capable of discovering URLs that appear in Flash files, and feeding them into their crawling pipeline. This means that Google can now crawl more of your website. And all this can be done without requiring any special action on the part of the webmasters and web designers. All that is required is only Flash content in your website.
Google’s new algorithm for Flash is limited to only textual content. As a result, if your Flash files include only images or videos (FLV files), Google will not be able to recognise any of such pages. Also, the text that may appear in those images or videos will not get indexed by Google. As this new algorithm targets only text in Flash files, it will not be able to generate any anchor text for Flash buttons which have some URL, but no associated text. As said by Ron Adler and Janis Stipins, “If you prefer Google to ignore your less informative content, such as a “copyright” or “loading” message, consider replacing the text with an image, which will make it effectively invisible to us.”
The new Flash algorithm of Google suffers from a few technical limitations. First, a Flash file may not get indexed by Googlebot if it has been loaded via JavaScript. This is because Googlebot does not execute some types of JavaScript. The second limitation is that this new algorithm does not attach content from external resources that are loaded by your Flash files. Yet another limitation is the inability of the algorithm to index Flash content written in bi-directional languages, such as Hebrew or Arabic. However, all these limitations are only for the time being and are likely to get resolved soon.
