Apache: The Definitive Guide, 3rd Edition

Name

Options

Synopsis

Options option 
                     option ...
Default: All
Server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess

The Options directive is unusually multipurpose and does not fit into any one site or strategic context, so we had better look at it on its own. It gives the webmaster some far-reaching control over what people get up to on their own sites. option can be set to None, in which case none of the extra features are enabled, or one or more of the following:

All

All options are enabled except MultiViews (for historical reasons).

ExecCGI

Execution of CGI scripts is permitted — and impossible if this is not set.

FollowSymLinks

The server will follow symbolic links in this directory.

Note

Even though the server follows the symlink, it does not change the pathname used to match against <Directory> sections.

This option gets ignored if set inside a <Location> section (see Chapter 14).

Includes

Server-side includes are permitted — and forbidden if this is not set.

IncludesNOEXEC

Server-side includes are permitted, but the #exec command and #exec CGI are disabled. It is still possible to #include virtual CGI scripts from ScriptAliased directories.

Indexes

If the customer requests a URL that maps to a directory and there is no index.html there, this option allows the suite of indexing commands to be used, and a formatted listing is returned (see Chapter 7 ).

MultiViews

Content-negotiated MultiViews are supported. This includes AddLanguage and image negotiation (see ...