BotSeer

Web-based information system

BotSeer was a Web-based information system and search tool used for research on Web robots and trends in Robot Exclusion Protocol deployment and adherence. It was created and designed by Yang Sun,[1] Isaac G. Councill,[2] Ziming Zhuang[3] and C. Lee Giles. BotSeer was in operation from 2007 to 2010, approximately.

## History

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BotSeer served as a resource for studying the regulation and behavior of Web robots as well as information about the creation of effective robots.txt files and crawler implementations. It was publicly available on the World Wide Web at the College of Information Sciences and Technology at the Pennsylvania State University.

BotSeer provided services including robots.txt searching, robot bias analysis,[4][5] and robot-generated log analysis. The prototype of BotSeer also allowed users to search 6,000 documentation files and source codes from 18 open source crawler projects.

BotSeer had indexed and analyzed 2.2 million robots.txt files obtained from 13.2 million websites, as well as a large Web server log of real-world robot behavior and related analysis. BotSeer's goals were to assist researchers, webmasters, web crawler developers and others with web robots related research and information needs. However, some people received BotSeer negatively, arguing that it contradicted the purpose of the robots.txt convention.[6]

BotSeer had also had set up a honeypot[7] to test the ethics, performance and behavior of web crawlers.

## References

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* "Webmasters May Shape Search Results". Newsvine. Associated Press. November 28, 2007. Retrieved 2011-12-11.

* "Google favored by Web admins". Network World. November 15, 2007. Archived from the original on December 18, 2007. Retrieved 2007-12-19.

## Notes

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1. ^ "Yang Sun". Archived from the original on 2014-01-04. Retrieved 2019-06-13.
2. ^ Isaac G. Councill Archived May 17, 2014, at the Wayback Machine
3. ^ Ziming Zhuang Archived December 28, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
4. ^ Yang Sun, Z. Zhuang, I. Councill, C.L. Giles, Determining Bias to Search Engines from Robots.txt Archived 2015-04-02 at the Wayback Machine, Proceedings of IEEE/WIC/ACM International Conference on Web Intelligence (WI 2007), 149-155, 2007.
5. ^ "Zoom Web Media Offers Affordable Web Design, Development and SEO Services". www.zoomwebmedia.com. Archived from the original on 2012-11-30.
6. ^ BotSeer? - SEO Best Practices Search Engine Forums
7. ^ Web Robot Behavior and Performance Test at the Wayback Machine (archived December 22, 2008) (instead of unrelated current site )

## External links

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* "BotSeer: Robots.txt and Web Crawler Search Engine". Archived from the original on 2010-02-08. Retrieved 2011-12-11.