brainscat.com

In a quest to understand the differences between pingbacks and trackbacks and the purpose they serve, I’m creating this little example to sort out the answers. Previously in Trackbacks, Pingbacks, and Italian Plubmers, I linked to Brandon Furtwangler’s writeup on Super Mario Brothers level -1. Having pingbacked him and trackbacked him in the same post, it appears his WordPress software chose to treat it solely as a pingback. Web Standards and Playing Well With Others uses only the trackback method of alerting Matt from WordPress that I’m writing about him. Here’s the actual location of the pingback example in Brandon’s post comments. This is the trackback example on Matt’s site (comment #17, you have to scroll a bit).

Pingbacks and trackbacks show up as special comments on another person’s blog. They’re different from regular comments in that trackback and pingback comments originate on a seperate page on the Internet rather than the actual page that is the subject of discussion. In this case, brainscat is telling Brandon’s blog that I’ve written about his Super Mario Bros. tutorial, and his site displays a summary of my comments on his page with a link back here. Normally, a comment would be on the same page as the SMB writeup and exist nowhere else on the Internet.

Why would anyone use pingbacks or trackbacks if you can just leave a comment? Well, they serve these various purposes.

1. They bring traffic to your site, allowing for more people to see your blog.
2. Pingbacks and trackbacks let you keep your dialogue in your own space where you can edit and add to it as you please, without having to worry about the limitations of the subject’s software. This provides the ability to make a more rich commentary through the use of diagrams or other links.
3. You server, not the subject’s server, is responsible for the longevity of your comment.

Which method is better?

Pingbacks and trackbacks accomplish the exact same feat. It basically is a matter of what method your subject’s software supports.