Base HREF

[mcneely]

I've been doing it for years actually, and now here comes a mate to suggest that base href should include the index.htm or default.htm (for the home page).

It's been so long since I've given it any thought, that now, after our conversation, I find myself falling into a bit of a doubt and am looking for an opinion on the matter.

I've always, or at least had been for almost forever, just writing the primary url into the base href, for the home page, and not including the index.htm.

<base href="http://www.example.com/"> instead of <base href="http://www.example.com/index.htm">

I know I've developed a bad habit or two over the years, and I hope that this isn't one of them.

[jbinbpt]

I have never heard an argument for including a file in Base HREF This is from the W3C Tutorial [w3schools.com].

What was the argument for including the index file?

[mcneely]

We had gotten into a big discussion about things such as relative v.s absolute (links), scrapers, content theft, and other such things that go bump in the night on the web.

I used to write base href all the time for my own sites, but over the years I've wandered away from the relative in favour of the absolute. I still base href client sites though, as it is, and most likely always will be the practice around here.