Is google cache completely messed up?

[UKSBD]

I've been noticing more and more that the google cache is not very
accurate, so set a little test up yesterday by adding a line of text to
some old pages.

These pages are already showing up in the SERPs for these phrases, but
the cache shows old versions some still even dated from January.

The cache I am checking is from both the SERPs and the Toolbar, anyone
know of a more accurate way of checking cache dates and cached pages,
or is google cache just too messed up.

[fisicx]

As google says it's just a snapshot on a particular day and many bear no resemblance to either the indexed page or the actual page.

Cache takes up a lot of storage so Google may well only update when there is something worth upadating

[CaterTrade]

Google google's cached pages are often out of date, the cache frequency is anything from a month to 3 months.

[OldWelshGuy]

Also you can do a site: search, get a list of pages, click on the 'view cache' link and get no cache. I have checked and there is no 'nocache' on the page, it is yet another googlism.

[loredan]

Also you can do a site: search, get a list of pages, click on the 'view cache' link and get no cache. I have checked and there is no 'nocache' on the page, it is yet another googlism.

Another funny "googlism" is to run a site: search and get the same page indexed 3 times and cached on different days

website.com/page - cached 3 Feb
website.com/page - cached 5 Feb
website.com.page - cached 8 Feb

Same bloody page appears 3 times in the first 10 results...

[OldWelshGuy]

yep, different datacentres etc.

[UKSBD]

As google says it's just a snapshot on a particular day and many bear no resemblance to either the indexed page or the actual page.

Cache takes up a lot of storage so Google may well only update when there is something worth upadating

That contradicts what google say,

"The cached page appears to users exactly as it looked when Google last crawled it"

Google have obviously crawled the page as it shows up in the SERPs with
the new text added.

[CaterTrade]

Google have several bot, all with different jobs. There's the crawl bot which finds new pages, adds existance and title to the SERP and then marks them for indexing, the indexing bot which crawls and indexes all the page content and adds that to the SERP. Then eventually at no imediacy the google cache bot visits.

What they should say is "The cached page appears to users exactly as it looked when the Google Cache Bot last crawled it"

[Kev Jaques]

From reading between the lines a bit, it looks like you may still be letting it consume you. You have very little control over what Google do with their cache/data and it's like chasing the elusive pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
Would be better to concentrate on trying to get world peace ;) At least that isn't futile ;) (well almost ;) )
There is so much more to life than Google :)

[OldWelshGuy]

Google use proxy caching, so they might serve a version of a page that was craled by media bot for example, but the actual cached version of the page could be different.

[UKSBD]

From reading between the lines a bit, it looks like you may still be letting it consume you. You have very little control over what Google do with their cache/data and it's like chasing the elusive pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
Would be better to concentrate on trying to get world peace ;) At least that isn't futile ;) (well almost ;) )
There is so much more to life than Google :)


When you have people moaning because their details are displayed wrong
in google, even after you have updated them, you would realise that
trying to stop an old version showing even though google are already
seeing the new version is important to some people.

People think because google shows an old page, it is our fault.

[OldWelshGuy]

I have seen instances of google displaying the wrong site completely. Although in fairness I think that might have been down to pants server configuration more than google :)

[Ali-v-8]

Thank god you seen this too.
What do you think this is for?
I have been trying to figure it out.

Also you can do a site: search, get a list of pages, click on the 'view cache' link and get no cache. I have checked and there is no 'nocache' on the page, it is yet another googlism.

[Ali-v-8]

If you are on about the cache pages, then i have seen this but its usually a linked page. I assume google mixed up the page from where the link came in to to the actual url page.
I have seen instances of google displaying the wrong site completely. Although in fairness I think that might have been down to pants server configuration more than google :)

[UKSBD]

Also you can do a site: search, get a list of pages, click on the 'view cache' link and get no cache. I have checked and there is no 'nocache' on the page, it is yet another googlism.

It's not only whan doing site: searches, it's happening more and more in
the SERPs. I sometimes see pages in the SERPs which have no cache
(not just new pages too), even when there is a "view cache" link

[UKSBD]

I have seen instances of google displaying the wrong site completely. Although in fairness I think that might have been down to pants server configuration more than google :)


This happens a lot when people try to fake PR