[How To] Allow / Disallow Directory Browsing
 

Most servers are configured so that directory browsing is not allowed. This means that if a certain web directory does not contain an index (or default) file, then an error message will be displayed in the web browser.

If Directory Browsing is enabled, then the contents of the directory will be shown in the browser and you can click freely on files and folders therein.

Disllow Directory Browsing
If you want to Disallow Directory Browsing on a server that allows it, create an .htaccess file in the web root directory and add the following line:

Allow Directory Browsing
If you want to Allow Directory Browsing on a server that dies nto allow it by default, create an .htaccess file in the web root directory and add the following line:

Remember that .htaccess files do not work on Windows Servers, so you will have to have your web host set the configuration for you. Have fun with your server and htaccess!

Very nice. Thanks for your contribution.

Thanks, I've always just placed index pages in my directories with little messages in each. This could save me alot of time.

Killswitch: A lot of people do that, in fact I used to do that.

Is it possible to configure the page that the visitor sees when they try to browse a directory? I get, for the page title "Index of /(the directory)" and in the body it says "Index of /(the directory)", a server name, my site URL and a port number.

Can I change this to something else?

In IIS or Apache? In IIS it is in the configuration manager.

ps. This thread is more than 2 years old, you might have wanted to create a new one.

I'm using Apache.

I did realize that, thanks. :-/