Google Webmaster Tools Given Overhaul

It’s that time of year again; if you head to the nearest Lowe’s or Home Depot, you’ll see all sorts of guys fondling various shiny pieces of hardware. And for folks who spend more looking at monitors than chainsaws, something interesting is available, too: a fresh Google Webmaster Tools design.

The Webmaster Central Blog names a total of eight highlights pertaining to the redesign. We won’t churn through them all, but one of the more interesting (and immediately apparent) new features is what’s called the "one-stop dashboard." Here, you should now see Links to your site, Top search queries, Sitemaps, and Crawl errors.

More top search queries (specifically, up to 100) are also on tap. Sitemap tracking for multiple users is an option, too, and so is message subscription. Then, for people who might be feeling overwhelmed, the Help Center’s been streamlined, and the enhanced Image Search option has actually been removed.

On the whole, everything looks quite nice. In fact, of five comments left so far following the Webmaster Central Blog post, four are rather strongly in favor of the redesign.

The post also asked for feedback if you have any ideas for improvement, and promised that more updates are on the way.