Netpeak Spider 2.1 review: classification of issues, parameters selection, new results arrangement logic

About a month ago we announced the release of new Netpeak Software products → Netpeak Spider 2.0 and Netpeak Checker 2.0. You can always turn to that post if you haven’t read it yet to learn the full sequence of events. And now we are ready to present you a new version of the product – Netpeak Spider 2.1. I have been using 2.1 version in beta-testing mode over the past few weeks, and, frankly speaking, I wouldn't like to come back even to 2.0 version. Once you're spoiled, there's no way back! :)

Netpeak Spider is becoming a real ‘machine for search engine optimization’, so we thought: why not call it an 'SEO Terminator'.

Meet Netpeak Spider 2.1 – a program aimed for detection and elimination of on-page SEO issues. We want Aug 4, 2016 to remain in your memory as a ‘Crawling Day’.

1. Classification of issues

The detection of more than 50 types of issues was realized in the new version, and we prioritized them as follows:

• Error → critical issues
• Warning → important, but not critical issues
• Notice → issues you should pay attention to

Now, on the right side of the program you can see the ‘Issues’ panel – it is the place where all the issues found during the crawling are presented.

The issues list will be constantly enlarged and modified. However, now it looks like that:

*Good news: all duplicates search is being carried out in real time, which means that you don't have to call a separate tool for it → choose the necessary parameters, start crawling and enjoy! :)

To better understand the issues, put your cursor over the precise issue and view a tooltip. Notice that all the issues, which are not found in the moment of crawling, are stored in the bottom part of the new panel, in the ‘Not Detected Issues’ block. Those issues, whose detection is off are stored even lower, in the ‘Disabled Issues’.

2. New parameters and option for their selection

The new version provides an option to choose the particular parameters for crawling. That directly influences the crawling speed and the RAM consumption. For example, such parameters as Links, Redirects, Headers, and Images are resource-intensive (it is mentioned in their settings) – try to switch them off if you don’t need them in the current crawling.

Altogether there are 24 new parameters added to Netpeak Spider 2.1. They are:

All the issues are directly connected to the parameters where such issues can be detected. For instance, to check whether the <title> tags on the website are implemented correctly, you need to select Title parameter in the ‘Parameters’ tab of the crawling settings.

3. New logic of working with the results

Such a big amount of information has to be included in this section, that we had to resort to lists inside the lists :) So, let’s go.

3.1. Completely new results table

We’ve integrated completely new results table into Netpeak Spider 2.1, and we hope you’ll enjoy the features listed below:

Speed performance

It doesn’t actually matter how many results you have in the new table – one hundred or one million. You’ll be really surprised by the table response time, sometimes even doubting whether you managed to scroll to the right place so quickly :) In short, we did our best to provide you with better user experience and we’d be more than happy to hear your feedback.

Possibilities

✔ Grouping

Now you can group data by any parameter in any table. This will let you find new ways of looking at the crawling results. For instance, you can group the results by Status Code parameter and define which status code is more common for certain type of pages: Notice that grouping is possible not only by one column but by several columns too. Imagine the insights you may get having set right combinations.

✔ Columns on/off

If you click on any column name with the right mouse button you will see a convenient panel: there you’ll have an opportunity to set any column’s view which is enabled in the ‘Parameters’ tab of crawling settings: Be aware that export is influenced by the settings, so the export file will include all the results the view of which is on.

✔ Freezing columns

Now you can freeze any suitable number of rows, however ‘Number’ and ‘URL’ columns will be frozen by default. In the future updates saving the column width, order and freezing are to be implemented. But, unfortunately, now these settings are saved only within the current session (i.e. until you close the app).

3.2. New internal tables

Types of tables

✔ Issues info

We are proud to present a new additional table, where you can see all the issues found on the crawled website. Here, you can filter URLs by the issue type, its severity, and the parameters in which the issue was detected:

✔ Redirects

The updated table that shows all the redirects / chains of redirects found on the page(s):

✔ Links

An absolutely new table, which contains really useful data about the link type, anchor, alt attribute (if the image is in <a href=""> tag), rel attribute, and even URL source view:

✔ h1-h6 headers

Each header has its own table: In case you need to analyze h2-h6 headers, do not forget to enable their crawling in the ‘Parameters’ tab of the crawling settings.

✔ Images

A new additional table, where you can find the data about all images found in the <img> tag on the page(s).

New opportunities

✔ Current Table Summary

Another thing we are proud of – a unique feature, that allows you to open the necessary information (issues, links, redirects, h1 headers or images) for the pages in the current table.

You could try to filter the table by simply clicking on any issue type in the ‘Issue’ panel on the right side (e.g. 4xx Error Pages: Client Error, if any) and then select Current Table Summary → Incoming Links. In this case, you’ll get a complete list of broken links:

✔ Export

Now every internal table has the option to be exported, just the same as the information in the main results tables.

✔ Filters

A lot of new parameters you can filter the data by were added, and also such summary filters as: ‘All parameters’ (in this case all the cells in the results table will be filtered) and ‘URLs with issue’ (available only if the appropriate parameters are selected). "Length" is one more parameter you can now filter by→ any cell in the table can be filtered by its length.

Try to combine the two last features: first filter and then press ‘Export’ → only the filtered results will be exported in this case.

✔ Ways to choose the data

For your convenience there are now three ways you can choose the data:

• one URL → select any cell and call any internal table – thus, you’ll get the data only for the selected URL;
• a group of URLs → choose several URLs (with the pressed left mouse button or using SHIFT/CTRL key) and call one of the internal tables – in this case, the data will be grouped for the selected URLs;
• all URLs in the current table → click «Current Table Summary» button and choose any internal table; in this way you’ll get the data for all the URLs in the table.

Combining different ways of handling the data, you can work with the crawling results in the most efficient way. We’d be really happy to get your feedback, as far as we’ve put a lot of efforts into improving Netpeak Spider usability.

3.3. Highlighting the problems

Now, if a particular URL contains a mistake, only the URL cell and the parameters cell are highlighted, not the whole row. The color depends on the highest issue severity in this row or cell. We removed the opportunity to customize the table colors to show you the way we wanted to prioritize all the issues by their severity.

3.4. Better links distinguishing

Now all the links are divided into the exact types:

• AHREF → the most common link from <a href=""> tag
• IMG AHREF → so-called image links – images from the <img> tag inside the <a href=""> tag
• IMG → links to the images from <img> tag
• CSS → links to cascading style sheets
• JavaScript → links to JS-files
• Canonical → links from <link rel="canonical" /> tag in the <head> section
• Redirect → if Netpeak Spider detects redirect to any URL, it’ll mark that there is a ‘Redirect’ type link to this page
• LINK → to enable the detection of this type of links, you need to check crawling of the URLs from <link> tag in the ‘General’ tab of the crawling settings
• Meta Refresh → for detecting such type of links you should also check to consider Meta Refresh in the ‘Advanced’ tab of the crawling settings

Besides, we added some more parameters to every internal table with links:

• Alt → it is useful in case we deal with image links: anchor of such link will be an image alt attribute (if it exists) in <a href=""> tag
• Rel → use it to detect link with rel="nofollow" and other values of this attribute (learn more)
• URL Source View → a unique feature that shows you the original view of the link (just like crawler sees it), it’s helpful in case you need to find the exact link in the page source view

3.5. Ways to view the data and interact with it

We have completely reorganized all the tables having added new logic: if you can see underlined URLs or numbers, it means you can interact with them. For example, if you choose the underlined URL and press ‘Space’ button or double click with the left mouse button, it will open in your default browser.

If you try to repeat these actions with the number of Incoming links – you’ll call the internal table, where all the Incoming links to this page/pages are viewed.

3.6. Other improvements in the tables

Real time work

You don’t have to stop the crawling in order to filter or export the data – now you can work with all the tables in real time, even during the crawling. For example, you can set data filtering in the ‘Filters’ table and start the crawling – after that, all the data will be automatically represented in the table in accordance with the filter set: that is extremely convenient if you are looking for some particular information on the website.

Sorting

We offer three types of sorting: descending (by default), ascending, and ‘no sorting’ when clicking on the same column for the third time.

Dividing the tables into separate ones

We have divided the tables into separate, independent ‘All’, ‘Issues’, and ‘Filters’ tables. Now changes of the columns’ order or width in one table won’t cause synchronization with the other tables.

Tooltips

If there is no enough place to view all the information in the table, you’ll see the ellipsis (...). Try to put your cursor over the cell with the ellipsis and you’ll immediately see the tooltip with the full data inside the cell (notice that there will be no tooltips in case all the data is viewed). It allows not to expand the columns each time you can not see all the data.

Hotkeys

You can handle the internal tables using hotkeys: F1-F8. Open the context menu by pressing the right mouse button on the table, and you’ll find there all the possible combinations.

Show other improvements of Netpeak Spider 2.1

The future is not set!

It is you who should influence the Netpeak Spider development – leave your feedback, ask any questions bothering you, share your ideas or support those of other users:

• Netpeak Software Community
• Contact Us
• Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin

A quick recap

Now, when the detailed review is terminated, let’s sum it up. Netpeak Spider has become smarter, more flexible and powerful. And the benefits you are getting from the new Netpeak Spider 2.1 are:

• Detection of more than 50 on-page SEO issues
• 24 new parameters and the option to select/set them
• Absolutely new results table
• Improved logics of handling the data, including new internal tables
• Optimized export of the results and application architecture
• More convenient way to operate the results and more flexible crawling settings

If you haven’t had the opportunity to try Netpeak Spider yet, we are pleased to offer you a 14-day free trial that grants full access to all the tool’s features. In case you and Netpeak Spider are old friends, don’t waste your time to give the updated version a try until the global tool testing ends on Aug 19, 2016.

Try Netpeak Software Products

I’m proud of the work carried out and would like to get your feedback and advice on how to improve the program more. Come with me if you wanna do an effective SEO! And I’ll be back... with the updates!

We suggest you check out our next post from the Netpeak Software series → a review on Netpeak Spider 2.1.1. This update features two new crawling modes (list of URLs and XML sitemap), external link analysis, viewing page source and HTTP headers, as well as five new issues we are now able to detect.