A site map is an overview of your site. It shows the major areas of your site so your visitors can quickly get going the right direction. A one page site map is plenty. It typically does not show all the pages of your site. Just because a page is not shown doesn't mean that it is not indexed.

Because it is an overview of your site, not a detailed page-by-page listing. In addition "up" links (like links back to your home page) are not shown. This is to simplify the site map for your visitors and make it more useful. Just because a page is not shown doesn't mean that it is not indexed.

By default, the site map is automatically sized so that it doesn't end up being too big or too small. If you want to override this default size, log in to the Control Center, go to the page and use the map depth and format link. When the wizard appears, adjust the "map depth" value to vary the size of the map. For automatic sizing, set the value to 0. After your site is re-indexed the site map will reflect the new size setting.

What is site map "depth"? Basically it's a measure of how many clicks it takes to get to a page. If you have to click on two links to get to one of your pages from your home page, it has a depth of two. Setting the site map depth to 2 will make the site map include all pages up to and including pages at that depth.

Note that there are absolute limits on site map size. If your site is large it is unlikely that you will be able to have a site map which contains all the pages of your site.

By default, the title shown in the site map for a page is simply the page's actual title as specified by the title tag, i.e.:

			<title>My Page Title</title>
		

If you want to give a page a different title in the site map other than the page's actual title you can use a special FreeFind HTML tag. Simply paste the following tag into the page you want re-titled:

			<!-- FreeFind Map Title="Some Other Title" -->
		

Next time you spider your site, that page will be re-titled.
Note: The new page title applies to your "what's new listing", too.

You need to re-spider your site before most customizations will show up in your site map. To do this simply log in to the Control Center, go to the page and use the index now link.

To do this log in to the Control Center, go the to the page, and then click on the set map type link. When the "wizard" appears, uncheck the three different types of site maps and press the Finish button to save your changes. Note that, unlike many changes, this one does not happen immediately. After your site is spidered next the site map links will be gone.

You will also want to remove the site map button from your search panel or select a search panel without the site map button in the first place so that visitors to your site don't try to access it.

This happens to FrontPage users with image maps. You can use the following exclusion to prevent that DLL from being indexed:

			*/_vti_bin/shtml.dll*
		

For information on exclusions read How to Exclude Pages from Search.

This happens to FrontPage users with image maps. You can use the following exclusion to prevent that DLL from being indexed:

			*/_vti_bin/shtml.dll*
		

For information on exclusions read How to Exclude Pages from Search.

You can do this by adding a special FreeFind HTML tag to the page that you want excluded from your site map. Simply paste the following tag into the page you want excluded:

			<!-- FreeFind No Map -->
		

Next time you spider your site, that page will be excluded.
Note: Removing a page from the site map also removes the pages linked below it. Using this tag "prunes a branch off the site map tree".

By default, a site map is created for your site every time your site is spidered (indexed). If you have turned off your site map you can turn it on again. To do this log in to the Control Center, go to the page, and then click on the set map type link. When the "wizard" appears, choose the type of map(s) that you want and which one should be displayed to the user by default. For most sites we recommend the "outline" type of site map. After turning site maps back on re-spider your site.

You can either use a search panel which has a site map button or you can use a simple text link. In either case you can find the HTML that you need by logging in to the Control Center and then going to the page.

There are three different types of site maps available:

1. Outline - A list of your sites pages in classic outline format. Each page is listed along with the "deeper" pages that are linked off that page. This is the default type of Site Map.
2. Table - A series of tables of your sites primary pages and the "deeper" links off them. Each table starts with the title of the primary page, then has a bar, then has a list of pages linked off the primary page. Only pages with sublinks have tables generated for them.
3. List - A simple list of the pages in your site, arranged in depth order. Bars visually separate pages of different depth.

The outline type is usually the best and it is chosen to be the default site map shown.

You can select which types of site maps are available to your visitors, or turn off the site maps altogether. To do this first log in then go to the page and click on the Set map type link. When the wizard appears check the types of site maps you want or uncheck all map types to turn off the site maps completely. Of course if you turn off all the site maps you will need to remove any "site map" button that may be in your search panel.