Re: Apache case-insensitivity without mod_speling

Paul Mackinney wrote:
> I'm migrating a web server from Xserve to Linux, and there's an oddity
> in the Apache config: The old server is demonstrably case-insensitive.
>
> The new server is not, and has "bugs" because the HTML doesn't always
> match case with directory names on the file system. However, mod_speling
> is not being loaded or added--it's commented out in the httpd.conf file.
> Is this an artifact of the MacOS file system? Any other likely
> explanations?

The default filesystem on OS X is Apple's HFS+, which indeed is
case-insensitive. Linux filesystems, and pretty much every Unix-like
filesystem except HFS+, are case-sensitive.

I would still consider it a bug to have URLs which differ in case from
the underlying filename, even if it used to work on OS X. You should
fix those errors in your HTML code (or by renaming the underlying
files). (Further, I would recommend using all-lowercase for filenames
in web directories, but it's more important to have a standard than what
the standard actually is).

mod_speling is off by default in the Apache configuration, but turning
it on would at least work around your immediate problem.

-- 
Tom Holub (tom_at_LS.Berkeley.EDU, 510-642-9069)
Director of Computing, College of Letters & Science
249 Campbell Hall
<http://LS.berkeley.edu/lscr/>

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