Google has announced the addition of external resource loading to its Flash indexing capabilities.

According to a post on the Google Webmaster Central blog, this means that Google is now able to index content that is loaded by a SWF file from another file, such as HTML, XML or other SWF files.

Google is then able to associate this content with the parent SWF file and any documents that might embed it.

Software engineer Janis Stipins said: "This new capability improves search quality by allowing relevant content contained in external resources to appear in response to users' queries."

The search engine's other Flash indexing capabilities include the ability to index the textual content that is shown when a user interacts with a SWF file, the discovery of links within Flash files and support for JavaScript techniques for embedding Flash.

Last year, Adobe Systems announced a partnership with Google and Yahoo! to make it easier for the search engines to index Flash content and rich internet applications.

Adobe estimates that some 99 per cent of all computers and laptops used to log on to the web have its Flash player installed.