There are two types of META tags, HTTP-EQUIV and tags with a NAME attribute. HTTP-EQUIV tags are similar to HTTP headers. The HTTP header is the information that is transmitted after a request is made for your web page. It contains information which is useful to the web browser for how to display your page.
META tags with a NAME attribute are tags that do not have corresponding header information. These tags were originally designed for large sites to easily catalogue their pages but have been used lately by search engines to help extrapolate what is on your web page.
The format of a META tag is simple, two examples are:
<META NAME="description" CONTENT="A tutorial covering the basic and advanced uses of META tags.">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" CONTENT="0">
The < followed by "META" signals the browser that this is a META tag, the next word is what indicates which type of META tag it is, a NAME tag or an HTTP-EQUIV tag. Next, the Content is what the browser should do with the tag. In the first example, we are setting the description of the page to read "A tutorial covering the basic and advanced uses of META tags." Though we won't see this on the web page when we load it, some search engines use this to provide a description in search results listings.
In the second example, we are using HTTP-EQUIV to set a refresh rate. Don't worry too much about what those tags are doing right now, we will explain that in a second, just get familiar with how the tag is structured.
META tags should be placed inside the <HEAD> </HEAD> HTML tags.
