Trackbacks - What Are They And What’s Their Use?
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Trackbacks are probably the most confused term about blogging. You’ve seen them when you’re posting in forums, and you see a ‘Trackbacks’ option in your blogging software, but you don’t know what they mean 
.
But, not to worry, since I’m going to explain to you right now what they mean and how they work.
Trackbacks are a way of communication between sites
In other words, sites(blogs) use trackbacks to communicate with each other. They tell other sites about updates related to those sites on your blog. Suppose you blog about something which is on a different blog. A trackback is sent to that blog which notifies the blogger that you have been talking about his post on your blog (Trackbacks normally show up in comments with ‘[...]’s at the beginning and at the end). Here’s an example:
- Sam blogs about apples on his blog.
- I like the post and decide to blog about that post on my own blog, optionally adding my comments.
- My blogging software sends a trackback to Sam’s blog and they appear in in his comments.
Usually, this is all automatic. You just have to put the link in your post, and the blogging software(Wordpress, Blogger, etc) handles it all for you. In other cases, you have to manually put in the trackback URLs. For example, in Wordpress.org, you specify trackbacks here:
They’re as simple as that.
What’s so ooh-aah about them?
Well, nothing, really. Trackbacks are just a way of telling other bloggers ‘I talked about your blog post on my blog’ but usually what the trackbacker is really thinking is ‘Since I talked about your blog, you should talk about mine too’. But, there are some honest trackbackers too out there with no such motive ;).
So, the hope of the trackbacker is that the trackbackee (wow, I can make up terms!) will notice that someone talked about their blog post and then, if the trackback gets approved, it’ll be published (in the comments) and hopefully, some one will click through to read what you were saying. Too much to ask for, really.
Also, trackbacks are a common spamming weapon, and it really can become a pain in the you-know-where, trying to moderate all those trackbacks. Therefore, many blogs(not this one) have trackbacks disabled.
So, there you have it, the definition of trackbacks, with a little mirch masala(for South Asian readers) added by me!
P.S. : I have good reason to believe that many of you will blog about this post and send me trackbacks. I’ll be ready for the flood! LOL 
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Thank’s a lott dude…..well i’ve really been confused about this term…i really have to appreciate you for what you are doing according to your age…. thumps up 2 u…
thanks a lot, Roshan, for your encouraging blomments!
I’ll always be aiming to provide such useful and helpful content
Off topic here, but you might want to optimise the header of this blog to make it shorter. Currently, much of the content is below the fold, which is bad.
Or is it because the design is broken in the stupid IE, which I am forced to use now?
PS: The feed icon at the bottom really sucks - the white areas have not been erased properly, and you’d be better off using a transparent gif/png feed icon and rotating it to fit.
@Sumesh : I see. This blog is still a new born and i’m trying hard to weed out any discrepancies…
Thanks for pointing out the defects… I’ll do something about that feed icon and do smthing abt the header..
Thanks again!
‘Since I talked about your blog, you should talk about mine too’
I would really like to se mr. Chow talking about mine site! :twisted:
well, it`s a comunication between blogs, but i think that it`s only for a blogs in start. Cause, when you are pinging a bigger blog, you don`t expect to get post about your site… You just hope that someone might see your trackback in a sea of comments and for some strange reason, visit your site!
Thanks to the article, Now there is more reason to comment than ever before! Everyone should participate. I am incorporating what your wrote to our project!