How do you check the google cache for hashbang pages?

[navidash]

So we use http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:x.com/#!/hashbangpage to check what googlebot has cached but when we try to use this method for hashbang pages, we get the x.com's cache... not x.com/#!/hashbangpage

That actually makes sense because the hashbang is part of the homepage in that case so I get why the cache returns back the homepage.

My question is - how can you actually look up the cache for hashbang page?

[Carson-Ward]

I was actually trying to give you the tools to figure out what's cached and indexed. You can just run a site search for the content and look at the cache, though. For example:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wIHvFryFPo4J:www.kingskolacheny.com/%23!cateringandcontact/c1d94+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

If nothing shows up it's probably not indexed.

[navidash]

Thanks Carson but that wasn't the question.

The question was how to check the cache.

[Carson-Ward]

Generally I'd avoid hashtags or hashbangs if you have large amounts of content you want indexed behind a hashbang. Use pushState instead whenever it makes sense for the user to actually change the URL.

The general rule is that if you can see the content in your page source (ctrl+u version), it's probably being indexed. That means that client-side AJAX behind hashbangs is generally not indexed, where server-side will generally get indexed.

If for some reason you must use hashbangs, AND you must use client-rendering content, create an HTML snapshot of your page for Google. Generally, though, that's more effort than changing one of the above.

[navidash]

I think google has stopped responding to cache requests on hashbang pages all together.

See here... **I'm just playing with random urls and don't see google cache 404'ing as it should **http://recordit.co/XBlo3U2A73

You can really put anything there it won't work.

[MattAntonino]

Searching for indexed & duplicate content.  I put a line or two in quotes and Googled it.  I found most of the UTMs that way. Once you do that, it's a simple change to site:yoursite.com inurl:UTM

[navidash]

Thanks a lot, Matt.

I'm curious.. how did you exactly find the version with the utm codes that are being cached?

[MattAntonino]

Strangely, browseo sees it correctly: http://www.browseo.net/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fplaceit.net%2F%3F_escaped_fragment_%3D%2Fstages%2Fsamsung-galaxy-note-friends-park

I'm not 100% sure why this is happening on your site specifically. Normally the #! isn't too big of an issue for cache but I've seen it have a few hiccups.  These pages seem to be indexed fine but they aren't generating cache.

I did find a few working but only those with UTM codes:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:gRbYNNVyK18J:https://placeit.net/%23!/stages/office-by-the-window%3Futm_source%3Dblog%26utm_medium%3Dbanner%26utm_campaign%3Dbanner+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=au

This doesn't look like it's working but view the source code - the content is actually there.  I found it by Googling the content in " marks.

[navidash]

What you're saying make sense and our urls are setup like this but we still don't see just the homepage come up when looking up the google cache with the esc fragment version

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://placeit.net/?_escaped_fragment_=/stages/samsung-galaxy-note-friends-park

https://placeit.net/?_escaped_fragment_=/stages/samsung-galaxy-note-friends-park

homepage - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://placeit.net/?_escaped_fragment_=

[MattAntonino]

Let's use a Wix example site (not a client, just a sample from their page) as my example. Say you wanted to check:

http://www.kingskolacheny.com/#!press/crr2

In the source code I see the escaped fragment URL.  This is the one you can find a cache for:

http://www.kingskolacheny.com/?_escaped_fragment_=press/crr2

That leads me to: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.kingskolacheny.com/?_escaped_fragment_=press/crr2

If your #! URLs are not setup this way, you will struggle to see it. One page websites are ... one page. But if you have escaped fragment URLs setup, you should be able to submit those and go from there.

The easiest way I know to find these is Screaming Frog, Ajax tab, Ugly URL field - try that one.