Example “Trackback” or “Pingback”

Here are two good tutorials and the spec reference for the concept of trackback and pingback. These are listed from easiest to most difficult to digest, repectively:

1. Movable Type (successor to Six Apart), “Beginners Guide to Trackbacks“
2. Wikipedia definition for TrackBack
3. Six Apart (inventors of trackback) trackback specification

Why this requires so much explanation is beyond me. Suffice to say, it’s a way to link my comment about YOUR blog entry to MY blog. So, if I comment on Joe’s MSN blog in this entry, it will show up on Joe’s MSN blog and potentially bring people to the Vibe Technology Discussion. Pretty simple, eh? Ha. Try to make one. Are you supposed to click on the word that says “trackback”? (HINT: No. You copy that link to your blog entry. sigh.)For me to connect to an entry on Joe’s MSN blog, I have to copy the trackback link from there into THIS entry. The trackback URL from Joe’s MSN Blog looks like this:

http://spaces.msn.com/members/jblog5/blog/cns!1pLWGW7wYxjf6HAnzeuSyAyA!116.trak

You can read the entry by clicking the ‘permalink’ here:

http://spaces.msn.com/members/jblog5/Blog/cns!1pLWGW7wYxjf6HAnzeuSyAyA!116.entry

The difference between the two is simply the extension ‘entry’ vs. ‘trak’, but keep in mind that is MSN’s design decision; bloggers can create whatever URL format they wish.