Description: | Generates directory indexes, automatically, similar to the Unixls command or the Win32dir shell command |
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Status: | Base |
Module Identifier: | autoindex_module |
Source File: | mod_autoindex.c |
The index of a directory can come from one of two sources:
index.html
. TheDirectoryIndex
directive sets the name of the file or files to be used. This is controlled bymod_dir
.AddIcon
,AddIconByEncoding
andAddIconByType
are used to set a list of icons to display for various file types; for each file listed, the first icon listed that matches the file is displayed. These are controlled bymod_autoindex
.The two functions are separated so that you can completely remove (or replace) automatic index generation should you want to.
Automatic index generation is enabled with usingOptions +Indexes
. See theOptions
directive for more details.
If theFancyIndexing
option is given with theIndexOptions
directive, the column headers are links that control the order of the display. If you select a header link, the listing will be regenerated, sorted by the values in that column. Selecting the same header repeatedly toggles between ascending and descending order. These column header links are suppressed with theIndexOptions
directive'sSuppressColumnSorting
option.
Note that when the display is sorted by "Size", it's theactual size of the files that's used, not the displayed value - so a 1010-byte file will always be displayed before a 1011-byte file (if in ascending order) even though they both are shown as "1K".
Various query string arguments are available to give the client some control over the ordering of the directory listing, as well as what files are listed. If you do not wish to give the client this control, theIndexOptions IgnoreClient
option disables that functionality.
The column sorting headers themselves are self-referencing hyperlinks that add the sort query options shown below. Any option below may be added to any request for the directory resource.
C=N
sorts the directory by file nameC=M
sorts the directory by last-modified date, then file nameC=S
sorts the directory by size, then file nameC=D
sorts the directory by description, then file nameO=A
sorts the listing in Ascending OrderO=D
sorts the listing in Descending OrderF=0
formats the listing as a simple list (not FancyIndexed)F=1
formats the listing as a FancyIndexed listF=2
formats the listing as an HTMLTable FancyIndexed listV=0
disables version sortingV=1
enables version sortingP=pattern
lists only files matching the givenpatternNote that the 'P'attern query argument is testedafter the usualIndexIgnore
directives are processed, and all file names are still subjected to the same criteria as any other autoindex listing. The Query Arguments parser inmod_autoindex
will stop abruptly when an unrecognized option is encountered. The Query Arguments must be well formed, according to the table above.
The simple example below, which can be clipped and saved in a header.html file, illustrates these query options. Note that the unknown "X" argument, for the submit button, is listed last to assure the arguments are all parsed beforemod_autoindex
encounters the X=Go input.
<form action="" method="get"> Show me a <select name="F"> <option value="0"> Plain list</option> <option value="1" selected="selected"> Fancy list</option> <option value="2"> Table list</option> </select> Sorted by <select name="C"> <option value="N" selected="selected"> Name</option> <option value="M"> Date Modified</option> <option value="S"> Size</option> <option value="D"> Description</option> </select> <select name="O"> <option value="A" selected="selected"> Ascending</option> <option value="D"> Descending</option> </select> <select name="V"> <option value="0" selected="selected"> in Normal order</option> <option value="1"> in Version order</option> </select> Matching <input type="text" name="P" value="*" /> <input type="submit" name="X" value="Go" /></form>
Description: | Alternate text to display for a file, instead of anicon selected by filename |
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Syntax: | AddAltstringfile [file] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
AddAlt
provides the alternate text to display for a file, instead of an icon, forFancyIndexing
.File is a file extension, partial filename, wild-card expression or full filename for files to describe. IfString contains any whitespace, you have to enclose it in quotes ("
or'
). This alternate text is displayed if the client is image-incapable, has image loading disabled, or fails to retrieve the icon.
AddAlt "PDF file" *.pdfAddAlt Compressed *.gz *.zip *.Z
Description: | Alternate text to display for a file instead of an iconselected by MIME-encoding |
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Syntax: | AddAltByEncodingstringMIME-encoding[MIME-encoding] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
AddAltByEncoding
provides the alternate text to display for a file, instead of an icon, forFancyIndexing
.MIME-encoding is a valid content-encoding, such asx-compress
. IfString contains any whitespace, you have to enclose it in quotes ("
or'
). This alternate text is displayed if the client is image-incapable, has image loading disabled, or fails to retrieve the icon.
AddAltByEncoding gzip x-gzip
Description: | Alternate text to display for a file, instead of anicon selected by MIME content-type |
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Syntax: | AddAltByTypestringMIME-type[MIME-type] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
AddAltByType
sets the alternate text to display for a file, instead of an icon, forFancyIndexing
.MIME-type is a valid content-type, such astext/html
. IfString contains any whitespace, you have to enclose it in quotes ("
or'
). This alternate text is displayed if the client is image-incapable, has image loading disabled, or fails to retrieve the icon.
AddAltByType 'plain text' text/plain
Description: | Description to display for a file |
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Syntax: | AddDescriptionstring file [file] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
This sets the description to display for a file, forFancyIndexing
.File is a file extension, partial filename, wild-card expression or full filename for files to describe.String is enclosed in double quotes ("
).
AddDescription "The planet Mars" mars.gifAddDescription "My friend Marshall" friends/mars.gif
The typical, default description field is 23 bytes wide. 6 more bytes are added by theIndexOptions SuppressIcon
option, 7 bytes are added by theIndexOptions SuppressSize
option, and 19 bytes are added by theIndexOptions SuppressLastModified
option. Therefore, the widest default the description column is ever assigned is 55 bytes.
Since theFile argument may be a partial file name, please remember that a too-short partial filename may match unintended files. For example,le.html
will match the filele.html
but will also match the fileexample.html
. In the event that there may be ambiguity, use as complete a filename as you can, but keep in mind that the first match encountered will be used, and order your list ofAddDescription
directives accordingly.
See theDescriptionWidthIndexOptions
keyword for details on overriding the size of this column, or allowing descriptions of unlimited length.
Descriptive text defined withAddDescription
may contain HTML markup, such as tags and character entities. If the width of the description column should happen to truncate a tagged element (such as cutting off the end of a bolded phrase), the results may affect the rest of the directory listing.
Absolute paths are not currently supported and do not match anything at runtime. Arguments with relative path information, which would normally only be used in htaccess context, are implicitly prefixed with '*/' to avoid matching partial directory names.
Description: | Icon to display for a file selected by name |
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Syntax: | AddIconiconname [name]... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
This sets the icon to display next to a file ending inname forFancyIndexing
.Icon is either a (%-escaped) relative URL to the icon, a fully qualified remote URL, or of the format (alttext,url)
wherealttext is the text tag given for an icon for non-graphical browsers.
Name is either^^DIRECTORY^^
for directories,^^BLANKICON^^
for blank lines (to format the list correctly), a file extension, a wildcard expression, a partial filename or a complete filename.
^^BLANKICON^^
is only used for formatting, and so is unnecessary if you're usingIndexOptions HTMLTable
.
#ExamplesAddIcon (IMG,/icons/image.png) .gif .jpg .pngAddIcon /icons/dir.png ^^DIRECTORY^^AddIcon /icons/backup.png *~
AddIconByType
should be used in preference toAddIcon
, when possible.
Description: | Icon to display next to files selected by MIMEcontent-encoding |
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Syntax: | AddIconByEncodingiconMIME-encoding[MIME-encoding] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
This sets the icon to display next to files withFancyIndexing
.Icon is either a (%-escaped) relative URL to the icon, a fully qualified remote URL, or of the format(alttext,url)
wherealttext is the text tag given for an icon for non-graphical browsers.
MIME-encoding is a valid content-encoding, such asx-compress
.
AddIconByEncoding /icons/compress.png x-compress
Description: | Icon to display next to files selected by MIMEcontent-type |
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Syntax: | AddIconByTypeiconMIME-type[MIME-type] ... |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
This sets the icon to display next to files of typeMIME-type forFancyIndexing
.Icon is either a (%-escaped) relative URL to the icon, a fully qualified remote URL, or of the format(alttext,url)
wherealttext is the text tag given for an icon for non-graphical browsers.
MIME-type is a wildcard expression matching required the mime types.
AddIconByType (IMG,/icons/image.png) image/*
Description: | Icon to display for files when no specific icon isconfigured |
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Syntax: | DefaultIconurl-path |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheDefaultIcon
directive sets the icon to display for files when no specific icon is known, forFancyIndexing
.Url-path is a (%-escaped) relative URL to the icon, or a fully qualified remote URL.
DefaultIcon /icon/unknown.png
Description: | Name of the file that will be inserted at the topof the index listing |
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Syntax: | HeaderNamefilename |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheHeaderName
directive sets the name of the file that will be inserted at the top of the index listing.Filename is the name of the file to include.
HeaderName HEADER.html
Both HeaderName andReadmeName
now treatFilename as a URI path relative to the one used to access the directory being indexed. IfFilename begins with a slash, it will be taken to be relative to theDocumentRoot
.
HeaderName /include/HEADER.html
Filename must resolve to a document with a major content type oftext/*
(e.g.,text/html
,text/plain
, etc.). This means thatfilename may refer to a CGI script if the script's actual file type (as opposed to its output) is marked astext/html
such as with a directive like:
AddType text/html .cgi
Content negotiation will be performed ifOptions
MultiViews
is in effect. Iffilename resolves to a statictext/html
document (not a CGI script) and either one of theoptions
Includes
orIncludesNOEXEC
is enabled, the file will be processed for server-side includes (see themod_include
documentation).
If the file specified byHeaderName
contains the beginnings of an HTML document (<html>, <head>, etc.) then you will probably want to setIndexOptions +SuppressHTMLPreamble
, so that these tags are not repeated.
Description: | Inserts text in the HEAD section of an index page. |
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Syntax: | IndexHeadInsert"markup ..." |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheIndexHeadInsert
directive specifies a string to insert in the<head> section of the HTML generated for the index page.
IndexHeadInsert "<link rel=\"sitemap\" href=\"/sitemap.html\">"
Description: | Adds to the list of files to hide when listinga directory |
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Syntax: | IndexIgnorefile [file] ... |
Default: | IndexIgnore "." |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheIndexIgnore
directive adds to the list of files to hide when listing a directory.File is a shell-style wildcard expression or full filename. Multiple IndexIgnore directives add to the list, rather than replacing the list of ignored files. By default, the list contains.
(the current directory).
IndexIgnore .??* *~ *# HEADER* README* RCS CVS *,v *,t
This directive does not currently work in configuration sections that have regular expression arguments, such as<DirectoryMatch>
Description: | Empties the list of files to hide when listinga directory |
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Syntax: | IndexIgnoreReset ON|OFF |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
Compatibility: | 2.3.10 and later |
TheIndexIgnoreReset
directive removes any files ignored byIndexIgnore
otherwise inherited from other configuration sections.
<Directory "/var/www"> IndexIgnore *.bak .??* *~ *# HEADER* README* RCS CVS *,v *,t</Directory><Directory "/var/www/backups"> IndexIgnoreReset ON IndexIgnore .??* *# HEADER* README* RCS CVS *,v *,t</Directory>
Review the default configuration for a list of patterns that you might want to explicitly ignore after using this directive.
Description: | Various configuration settings for directoryindexing |
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Syntax: | IndexOptions [+|-]option [[+|-]option]... |
Default: | By default, no options are enabled. |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheIndexOptions
directive specifies the behavior of the directory indexing.Option can be one of
IndexOptions HTMLTable
is in effect and anIndexStyleSheet
is defined. Rather than the standardeven
andodd
classes that would otherwise be applied to each row of the table, a class ofeven-ALT
orodd-ALT
whereALT is either the standard alt text associated with the file style (eg.snd,txt,img, etc) or the alt text defined by one of the variousAddAlt*
directives.Charset
keyword allows you to specify the character set of the generated page. The default isUTF-8
on Windows and Mac OS X, andISO-8859-1
elsewhere. (It depends on whether the underlying file system uses Unicode filenames or not.)IndexOptions Charset=UTF-8
DescriptionWidth
keyword allows you to specify the width of the description column in characters.-DescriptionWidth
(or unset) allowsmod_autoindex
to calculate the best width.DescriptionWidth=n
fixes the column width ton bytes wide.DescriptionWidth=*
grows the column to the width necessary to accommodate the longest description string.See the section onAddDescription
for dangers inherent in truncating descriptions.FoldersFirst
is enabled, subdirectoryZed
will be listed before subdirectoryBeta
, which will be listed before normal filesGamma
andAlpha
.This option only has an effect ifFancyIndexing
is also enabled.FancyIndexing
constructs a simple table for the fancy directory listing. It is necessary for utf-8 enabled platforms or if file names or description text will alternate between left-to-right and right-to-left reading order.IconWidth
, will cause the server to includeheight
andwidth
attributes in theimg
tag for the file icon. This allows browser to precalculate the page layout without having to wait until all the images have been loaded. If no value is given for the option, it defaults to the standard height of the icons supplied with the Apache httpd software.This option only has an effect ifFancyIndexing
is also enabled.IconHeight
, will cause the server to includeheight
andwidth
attributes in theimg
tag for the file icon. This allows browser to precalculate the page layout without having to wait until all the images have been loaded. If no value is given for the option, it defaults to the standard width of the icons supplied with the Apache httpd software.IgnoreCase
is enabled, file Zeta will be listed after file alfa (Note: file GAMMA will always be listed before file gamma).mod_autoindex
to ignore all query variables from the client, including sort order (impliesSuppressColumnSorting
.)NameWidth
keyword allows you to specify the width of the filename column in bytes.-NameWidth
(or unset) allowsmod_autoindex
to calculate the best width, but only up to 20 bytes wide.NameWidth=n
fixes the column width ton bytes wide.NameWidth=*
grows the column to the necessary width.AddDescription
then httpd will read the document for the value of thetitle
element. This is CPU and disk intensive.HTTP_UNAUTHORIZED
orHTTP_FORBIDDEN
IndexOptions IgnoreClient
.AddDescription
for information about setting the file description. See also theDescriptionWidth
index option to limit the size of the description column.This option only has an effect ifFancyIndexing
is also enabled.HeaderName
directive, the module usually includes the contents of the file after a standard HTML preamble (<html>
,<head>
,et cetera). TheSuppressHTMLPreamble
option disables this behaviour, causing the module to start the display with the header file contents. The header file must contain appropriate HTML instructions in this case. If there is no header file, the preamble is generated as usual. If you also specify aReadmeName
, and if that file exists, The closing </body></html> tags are also omitted from the output, under the assumption that you'll likely put those closing tags in that file.SuppressIcon
andSuppressRules
yields proper HTML 3.2 output, which by the final specification prohibitsimg
andhr
elements from thepre
block (used to format FancyIndexed listings.)FancyIndexing
is also enabled.hr
elements) in directory listings. Combining bothSuppressIcon
andSuppressRules
yields proper HTML 3.2 output, which by the final specification prohibitsimg
andhr
elements from thepre
block (used to format FancyIndexed listings.)This option only has an effect ifFancyIndexing
is also enabled.FancyIndexing
is also enabled.Last-Modified
andETag
values for the listed directory in the HTTP header. It is only valid if the operating system and file system return appropriate stat() results. Some Unix systems do so, as do OS2's JFS and Win32's NTFS volumes. OS2 and Win32 FAT volumes, for example, do not. Once this feature is enabled, the client or proxy can track changes to the list of files when they perform aHEAD
request. Note some operating systems correctly track new and removed files, but do not track changes for sizes or dates of the files within the directory.Changes to the size or date stamp of an existing file will not update theLast-Modified
header on all Unix platforms. If this is a concern, leave this option disabled.Type
keyword allows you to specify the MIME content-type of the generated page. The default istext/html.IndexOptions Type=text/plain
Last Modified
field was inadvertently changed to"%Y-%m-%d %H:%M"
from"%d-%b-%Y %H:%M"
in 2.4.0. Setting this option restores the date format from 2.2 and earlier.VersionSort
keyword causes files containing version numbers to sort in a natural way. Strings are sorted as usual, except that substrings of digits in the name and description are compared according to their numeric value. foo-1.7
foo-1.7.2
foo-1.7.12
foo-1.8.2
foo-1.8.2a
foo-1.12
If the number starts with a zero, then it is considered to be a fraction:
foo-1.001
foo-1.002
foo-1.030
foo-1.04
XHTML
keyword forcesmod_autoindex
to emit XHTML 1.0 code instead of HTML 3.2.This option only has an effect ifFancyIndexing
is also enabled.Be aware of how multipleIndexOptions
are handled.
IndexOptions
directives for a single directory are now merged together. The result of:<Directory "/foo"> IndexOptions HTMLTable IndexOptions SuppressColumnsorting</Directory>
will be the equivalent of
IndexOptions HTMLTable SuppressColumnsorting
+
or-
).Whenever a '+' or '-' prefixed keyword is encountered, it is applied to the currentIndexOptions
settings (which may have been inherited from an upper-level directory). However, whenever an unprefixed keyword is processed, it clears all inherited options and any incremental settings encountered so far. Consider the following example:
IndexOptions +ScanHTMLTitles -IconsAreLinks FancyIndexingIndexOptions +SuppressSize
The net effect is equivalent toIndexOptions FancyIndexing +SuppressSize
, because the unprefixedFancyIndexing
discarded the incremental keywords before it, but allowed them to start accumulating again afterward.
To unconditionally set theIndexOptions
for a particular directory, clearing the inherited settings, specify keywords without any+
or-
prefixes.
Description: | Sets the default ordering of the directory index |
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Syntax: | IndexOrderDefault Ascending|DescendingName|Date|Size|Description |
Default: | IndexOrderDefault Ascending Name |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheIndexOrderDefault
directive is used in combination with theFancyIndexing
index option. By default, fancyindexed directory listings are displayed in ascending order by filename; theIndexOrderDefault
allows you to change this initial display order.
IndexOrderDefault
takes two arguments. The first must be eitherAscending
orDescending
, indicating the direction of the sort. The second argument must be one of the keywordsName
,Date
,Size
, orDescription
, and identifies the primary key. The secondary key isalways the ascending filename.
You can, if desired, prevent the client from reordering the list by also adding theSuppressColumnSorting
index option to remove the sort link from the top of the column, along with theIgnoreClient
index option to prevent them from manually adding sort options to the query string in order to override your ordering preferences.
Description: | Adds a CSS stylesheet to the directory index |
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Syntax: | IndexStyleSheeturl-path |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheIndexStyleSheet
directive sets the name of the file that will be used as the CSS for the index listing.
IndexStyleSheet "/css/style.css"
Using this directive in conjunction withIndexOptions HTMLTable
adds a number of CSS classes to the resulting HTML. The entire table is given a CSS id ofindexlist
and the following classes are associated with the various parts of the listing:
Class | Definition |
---|---|
tr.indexhead | Header row of listing |
th.indexcolicon and td.indexcolicon | Icon column |
th.indexcolname and td.indexcolname | File name column |
th.indexcollastmod and td.indexcollastmod | Last modified column |
th.indexcolsize and td.indexcolsize | File size column |
th.indexcoldesc and td.indexcoldesc | Description column |
tr.breakrow | Horizontal rule at the bottom of the table |
tr.odd and tr.even | Alternating even and odd rows |
Description: | Name of the file that will be inserted at the endof the index listing |
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Syntax: | ReadmeNamefilename |
Context: | server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess |
Override: | Indexes |
Status: | Base |
Module: | mod_autoindex |
TheReadmeName
directive sets the name of the file that will be appended to the end of the index listing.Filename is the name of the file to include, and is taken to be relative to the location being indexed. IfFilename begins with a slash, as in example 2, it will be taken to be relative to theDocumentRoot
.
# Example 1ReadmeName FOOTER.html
# Example 2ReadmeName /include/FOOTER.html
See alsoHeaderName
, where this behavior is described in greater detail.
Copyright 2025 The Apache Software Foundation.
Licensed under theApache License, Version 2.0.