Hello all. I'm a complete noob and would like some help.

Ok, that is what someone on another board is telling me.

Well, while you are reorganizing your site, reorganize it the right way.
You should never expose index files at all.
If your site is example.com, you should not be distributing links to example.com/index.php, example.com/index.html, or example.com/index.anything.
Links to your site should be to example.com.
Period.

I do not understand this. I am in the process of building/reorganizing a site with and Index.html and additional pages that are linked to the Index.html page.

So are they saying that I should not use:

www.mysite.com/Index.html

or when I click on the "misc" link in the Index.html page that the browser shows:

www.mysite.com/Misc.html?

If so how do you change this? I hope this makes sense. Thanks!!

Just link to the root of the domain or any folder rather than to the specific index filenames

/folder/"

he gave you a good advice. He meant that when you do link building on other websites e.g. directory submission you should only put the main url.

For your internal page linkings it doesn't matter.

Originally Posted by webcosmo

he gave you a good advice. He meant that when you do link building on other websites e.g. directory submission you should only put the main url.

For your internal page linkings it doesn't matter.

Thanks! I'm not sure I understand this fully. Could you please provide an example so that it can sink in? Thanks again!

**So this has NOTHING to do with accessing links within my own site and the subsequent names of the pages? IE - www.mysite.com/Index.html --> click on "Misc" link on Index.html page which takes me to (as shown in browser) www.mysite.com/Misc.html? Thanks again!!

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Just link to the root of the domain or any folder rather than to the specific index filenames

/folder/"

Not sure I understand completely. Could you please provide an example? Thanks again!

Essentially when linking to pages within your site you will need to point to them directly (i.e. www.mysite.com/misc.html). However, if you are simply looking to link to your homepage you would be wiser to simply link www.mysite.com. The reason for this is that you could have your homepage actually saved as anything from index.html or index.php to default.html. If you want to link to one of those files in particular then www.mysite.com/index.html would be the way to do this.

Is there any implications if I use example.com/index.html? If yes what is it?

There are no implications at all under normal circumstances. There are however possible consequences when dealing with search engines.
The answer is to be consistent with linking. If your "external" links are to the root url (www .hostname.tld or hostname.tld) then your "internal" links should be as well.

Originally Posted by pityocamptes

Thanks! I'm not sure I understand this fully. Could you please provide an example so that it can sink in? Thanks again!

**So this has NOTHING to do with accessing links within my own site and the subsequent names of the pages? IE - www.mysite.com/Index.html --> click on "Misc" link on Index.html page which takes me to (as shown in browser) www.mysite.com/Misc.html? Thanks again!!

Look at my signature below, I am linking to my forum homepage without pointing to the index file, although the url would show the index file when somebody clicks it to visit.

But within your website pages you can certainly use index file to link for example <a href="index.html">Go to my home page</a>

Hope that makes sense.

Originally Posted by webcosmo

But within your website pages you can certainly use index file to link for example <a href="index.html">Go to my home page</a>

Hope that makes sense.

Nope! For internal links to the "home" page, You SHOULD use
<a href="/">Go to my home page</a>

Originally Posted by chrishirst

There are no implications at all under normal circumstances. There are however possible consequences when dealing with search engines.
The answer is to be consistent with linking. If your "external" links are to the root url (www .hostname.tld or hostname.tld) then your "internal" links should be as well.

thanks..also wanted to know this

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Nope! For internal links to the "home" page, You SHOULD use
<a href="/">Go to my home page</a>

yep you right.