internal linking to home page

any further explainations?

[chewy]

re internal links (back in April thread # www.webmasterworld.com/forum30/33982.htm) g1smd mentioned this:

"Make sure that your link to the root is in the format [domain.com...] and that it does NOT include the index file filename.

Likewise links to any index page in a folder should be in the format [domain.com...] and NOT include the index file filename."

Why do you suggest NOT including the index filename?

Is there a discussion elsewhere on this that you can point me to?

Thanks!

[webdude]

mmmm...

Why not check your PR for both and maybe that will give you a hint.

[g1smd]

If you link to /index.html from all of your internal pages, then all of your internal PageRank is focussed there.

Google, however, will prefer to list www.domain.com/ instead, and you haven't sent it any PageRank from inside the site.

Most of your external links will point to www.domain.com/ and when both URLs are seen you will have a "duplicate content" problem on your hands.

[g1smd]

Oh, and you can change the real file name from index.html to index.php at any time without having to change any of your internal linking at all.

[webdude]

g1smd

You may be able to change index.html to index.php at any time without having to change any of your internal linking, but I would think twice before doing so. Changing filenames can reek havoc on your site. I have one site still trying to recover from this. I would recommend a 301 if you are going to do this.

[g1smd]

Ah, but the whole point is this:

If you internally link to http://www.domain.com/ they will never know what the true filename really is, nor will they ever care: they never get to see it called by that name! Therefore you can change it any any time, and it will never matter.