SECTION V. Web Publications Conventions
J. Naming of files
STANDARDS:
1. Naming your home page
An institutional home page (i.e., top level page) must be named “welcome.htm,” “welcome.html,” “welcome.php," etc. The first two are preferred.
Explanation:
The Web server is configured to serve pages named “welcome.htm” and “welcome.html” as defaults. Thus the reference http://www.uwrf.edu/biology/ will serve the “http://www.uwrf.edu/biology/welcome.html” page. The file type “.shtml” is used to let the server know to parse this file for server side includes.
2. Referencing an institutional home page from a page within its own site should be relative when possible and should end in the directory name rather than the file name. Thus, in the example given above, the link to the biology home page would be “/biology/”.
Explanation:
Since the server knows to send the “welcome.html” page, adding that to the link is not necessary. Ending the link reference with the directory name rather than the file name makes it easier to change the file name of the home page to “.shtml” or “.jsp” at a later date, if needed.
3. Referencing the UWRF home page
The correct reference to the UWRF home page is as follows:
Absolute = http://www.uwrf.edu/
Relative = / (This is all that is needed. “/” is the root directory for the university’s server document hierarchy. Note that your pages must reside on the same server as the university’s home page to use this format.)
4. Referencing UWRF Home
The UWRF home page (www.uwrf.edu) should be referenced from the common navigation bar.
