> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.qrtub.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Page Metadata & Social Previews

> How a Page's browser title, link-preview card and search-engine directives are generated from the Item — and why pages are noindex but follow

You do not write metadata for a Page. It is generated from the Item the Page is showing, every time
the page is served:

| Metadata      | Comes from                                                                             |
| ------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Page title    | The Item's name, or "Unnamed Item" if it has none                                      |
| Description   | The Item's description — falling back to the Item's name when the description is blank |
| Preview image | The Item's image                                                                       |

That covers the browser tab, the search-engine snippet, and the card that appears when someone
pastes the Link into a messaging app or a work chat. Both OpenGraph and Twitter tags are emitted, so
the major platforms all read the same values. The card is the large-image style when the Item has an
image and the compact style when it does not.

There is no per-Page override for any of it. If a link preview says the wrong thing, the fix is the
Item's name, description or image — which also means a good Item description does double duty as the
preview text.

## Pages are noindex, follow

Every Page is served with instructions telling search engines **not to index it**, but **to follow**
the links on it.

The reasoning is worth knowing, because the first half surprises people who expected their pages to
rank. A Collection of a thousand Items produces a thousand thin, near-identical pages — "Pump 4A",
"Table 12" — sitting on `qrtub.com`. Indexing those would dilute the domain rather than help anyone
find anything, and none of them are pages a search visitor was looking for. Following the links
keeps any link equity flowing outward to the sites the page points at.

None of this affects scanning. Indexing directives are advice to crawlers; the page resolves
normally for any person who scans the code, whether or not it is indexed.

If you need a QR code to open something that *does* rank, point its Destination at a page on your
own website rather than trying to make a QRtub Page indexable — see [Direct Mode vs. Page
Mode](/pages/direct-mode-vs-page-mode).

## Private Items get minimal metadata

A private Item reveals nothing to a crawler or a link preview. Its metadata is deliberately
generic — the title reads "Private Item" and the description "Sign in to view this item" — and it is
marked both noindex *and* nofollow. The Item's real name, description and image never appear.

So pasting a private Link into a group chat produces a bland card that gives away nothing about the
equipment. See [Page Privacy: Public vs. Private](/pages/page-privacy).

## Two other cases you may see

* **A printed Link that is not connected to anything yet** gets its own placeholder metadata,
  titled "Unassigned Link", and is kept out of the index for the same reason as everything else. A
  batch of pre-printed codes will not turn into a batch of indexed empty pages.
* **A Link that redirects rather than opening a Page** has almost no metadata to speak of; there is
  no page to describe, only a redirect.

## Related

* [Page Privacy: Public vs. Private](/pages/page-privacy)
* [Pages Overview](/pages/pages-overview)
* [Name and Description](/items/name-and-description)
* [Unallocated Links](/links/unallocated-links)