Trackback and pingback programs were designed as a notification system between two websites. One website sends another website a pingback or trackback to notify them that something of interest to them has occurred on the site. These programs are most commonly used on blogs as a way of connecting a post you made on your blog to a post on another blog. The two things are basically the same, but do have a few minor differences.

How Trackbacks Work

Trackbacks can only be sent to one site, so when you use them you are presented with a list of the links in your story or blog post and you can only choose one site to receive the trackback. After you select a site you get a form that includes information about your post including, title, URL, URL of your site and the actual content of your post. At that point you edit any information you need to in the form and once you are done you can see a preview of your trackback. After all of this is done you will send your trackback off to your chosen site.

How a Pingback Works

Pingbacks are pretty much the same as a trackback, except they were designed after the trackback to fix some of the features that people didn’t like about the trackback. Primarily the difference in the two programs is that when you use a pingback you can inform several sites at once rather than having to select only one site at a time. The pingback program searches your entire entry for URLs and it sends a ping to every site that accepts pings in the content of your entry.

Pingback VS Trackbacks

Trackback and Pingbacks are pretty much the same program with similar functions and because of that you only need to use one of them. Both have their merits and most users decide which to use on a case by case basis.

Although Pingbacks are quicker to send they provide less information about your post, essentially all that they send out is a link. Trackbacks take much more time to prepare, but when you have to include more information they offer you that option.

Not all sites accept pingbacks and trackbacks because many have disabled the feature. These programs often have a feature that allows users to set their preferences for receiving pingbacks and trackbacks. Many people view these programs as spam and would rather not get them. This happens more often with pingbacks because of the fact that they are less specified.

Conclusion

When you are operating a blog, using a trackback or pingback service is important. It is essentially a way to let other authors know that you are quoting them in your blog or using information they have already written about. This can be a useful social networking tool for building blog readership.

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