sitemaps.org Home Protocol FAQ Language: English What are Sitemaps? Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters inform search engines about pages on their sites that are available for crawling: In its simplest form; Sitemap an XML file that lists URLs for site along with additional metadata about each URL (when was last updated, how often it usually changes; and how important it is_ relative other URLs in the site so that search engines can more intelligently crawl the site_ Web crawlers usually discover pages from links within the site and from other sites. Sitemaps supplement this data to allow crawlers that support Sitemaps to pick up all URLs in the Sitemap and Iearn about those URLs using the associated metadata. Using the Sitemap PrOtocol does not guarantee that web pages are included in search engines; but provides hints for web crawlers t0 do better job of crawling your site. Sitemap 0.90 offered under the terms 0f the Atributon-ShareAlke_Creative_Commons icense and has wide adoption, including support from Google, Yahoo!. and Microsoit 11Jef-€ [7 4 " _3 Temms and condiionz