FrontPage WebBots
server side 1997 deadMicrosoft FrontPage wrote its own comment directives into your HTML and needed its own server extensions to run them.
In 2026: Dead with FrontPage and its server extensions. The browser sees comments and the cached value between them, which is why an unmaintained page can still show a last updated date from 1999. The i-checksum was there to catch you editing it by hand.
Where it came from: Microsoft FrontPage 97 and 98 documentation. Wikipedia ↗
<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" S-Type="EDITED" S-Format="%m/%d/%y" startspan -->01/14/99<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" endspan i-checksum="12345" -->
<!--webbot bot="HTMLMarkup" startspan -->
<img src="https://xbawx.com/counter/3cswt32t59r8.png" alt="hit counter">
<!--webbot bot="HTMLMarkup" endspan -->
<!--webbot bot="Include" U-Include="../_private/nav.htm" TAG="BODY" startspan -->
... the included file's content was pasted here by the editor ...
<!--webbot bot="Include" endspan -->
<!--webbot bot="PurpleText" preview="Note to self: fix the guestbook link" -->
<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 4.0">
<meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document">