May 2021 Web News & Announcements

May 4, 2021

Google tweaks its search rankings to factor in a site's user experience

Google is making an update this month to include a factor called Page Experience, and the change could have an impact on search rankings.

Page Experience encompasses all aspects of how a user interacts with a web page, and it assigns metrics to gauge how satisfactory the experience is. 

Page Experience considers a site's loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability.

Pages that fall below the new benchmarks are expected to lag behind in search rankings and see a drop in traffic.

What web managers can do

OHIO's Web CMS has built-in functionality that enhances Page Experience, such as optimizing for mobile users and requiring alternative text (alt text) for images.

Still, there are steps web managers can take that will also help:

  • Focus on improving alt-text, which should generally describe the people, place, or action that is appearing in an image.
  • Label hypertext links more descriptively. Avoid terms such as "Click Here!" and instead structure the surrounding content to give clues about the content being linked to.
  • Learn about these and other simple tactics for improving digital accessibility. 

Read a BLOG article FROM 'SEARCH ENGINE WATCH' that details the GOOGLE changes 

 

How updates to the online academic catalog are managed

Since this time of year often spurs requests for updating information on the Ohio University Majors page, it’s helpful to understand how this content is managed. Here's an overview:

Catalog vs. Drupal Web CMS

The Ohio University Majors page in the Drupal Web CMS pulls information from the Undergraduate and Graduate catalogs, which are managed in a system called Acalog.

Occasionally, updated catalog information fails to make this Acalog-Drupal transfer. OHIO IT software engineers are working on improvements to this interface that should soon cut down on these occasional omissions.

Undergraduate Catalog Timeline

January to mid-April: College/school catalog editors collect updates within their areas for the coming academic year, submitting these to Registrar’s Office.

Mid-April to May 31: Registrar’s Office finalizes catalog, including any last-minute submissions.

May 31: Catalog publishes, in time for Bobcat Student Orientation.

 

Graduate Catalog Timeline

Mid-February to mid-May: Graduate College requests updates from school/college program directors for the coming academic year.

Mid-May to mid-July: Graduate College finalizes catalog, incorporating any state-level and university-level changes.

Mid-July: Graduate Catalog publishes, in time for fall semester.

 

Requesting Catalog Updates

  • Colleges and schools should follow the process outlined above for most catalog updates.
  • Once the online catalogs have been published, requests for changes can be emailed to the academic catalog editors who are listed in the Website Manager Directory under  "academic catalog."
  • If information is correct in the academic catalog but wrong on Ohio University Majors, please alert UCM by submitting a UCM Request.
     

Network outage planned for May 16

OHIO Information Technology (OIT) is planning to replace the firewall in the University's on-premise data center on Sunday, May 16, from 2 a.m. to 8 a.m. During this time, ALL network activity on campus will be down.

While this won't impact the primary ohio.edu website, nor email via Office365, there are some websites that will be affected during this time - primarily sites on the University's "ww2" and "ww3" servers (static sites), as well as page redirects.