Why my index.html doesn't work with php embeded?

phpsys

Hi,

I try to create a home page (index.html) with php/mysql code embeded. It doesn't work that way. My script works iff I save it as home.php and directly load it into browser.

Can anybody tell me whats wrong with this?

Thanks in advance!

Ravenous

PHP stand for PHP Hypertext Preprocessor. Notice the bold on 'Pre.' In essence, every page on your site that contains PHP code must be name "my_page.php" (or whatever extension you are using). As visitors request a page with the PHP extension, the server parses through that page first and executes all commands contained within your PHP tags. The preprocessor completes its work and prints whatever you specify to the document which is then, after its been parsed by PHP, sent to the visitor's browser to be rendered.

Without the PHP extension on the file, the server has no idea that it must first parse through it to find and execute any PHP code. With a .html extension, the server merely sends the data out and leaves everything up to the user's browser. So, if your files contain PHP code ANYWHERE, they need to be renamed with your PHP extension (usually .php).

I hope that helps.

phpsys

I appreciate your inputs!

That means the homepage (index.html) shouldn't have php in it.

My original idea was to retrieve data from MySql into my homepage. Do you know any workaround to this issue?

Thanks!

stick_figure

Yeah, can't you name it index.php? The server should still default to it. If you go http://www.mysite.com/ and the index.php is there, it will be shown. As long as there's no index.html. I think that takes priority.

Ravenous

The name of your index page is totally arbitrary. it all depends on what you tell the web server the index page is. It could be home.asp, my_index.php, or any other file. The web server generally has a list of files to look for. For instance, with IIS 5, if someone navigates to www.mysite.com, the default settings tell the server to first try to serve up default.asp. if that fails, default.htm, etc. It goes down the list until it finds a file that exists and serves that one up.

If you're running your own server, add index.php to that list and you'll be fine. If you're on a commercial host, find out which order their server looks for files and, if they don't have index.php as an option, ask them to add it.

phpsys

Hi all,

I renamed it as <index.php> and removed <index.html>. The Apache does load it (dont need the file path), but still only HTML parts show up in browser, and php part doesn't work (no data retrieved).

Again I type in the full path, it works fine.

Should I change something in my Apache server config file? How?

Thanks alot!

dalecosp

The relevant section of httpd.conf:

# DirectoryIndex: Name of the file or files to use as a pre-written HTML
# directory index.  Separate multiple entries with spaces.
#
<IfModule mod_dir.c>
    <IfModule mod_php3.c>
        <IfModule mod_php4.c>
            DirectoryIndex index.html index.php3 index.php
        </IfModule>
        <IfModule !mod_php4.c>
            DirectoryIndex index.php3 index.html
        </IfModule>
    </IfModule>
    <IfModule !mod_php3.c>
        <IfModule mod_php4.c>
            DirectoryIndex index.php index.html
        </IfModule>
        <IfModule !mod_php4.c>
            DirectoryIndex index.html
        </IfModule>
    </IfModule>
</IfModule>

This is from a server that uses mod_php4.
Note the first directory entry...this determines the order in
which Apache will look for an index page with the calling URI
is "/"....

You also would want this somewhere in httpd.conf:

AddType application/x-httpd-php .php .html

...with this setting, both files ending in
.php and .html will be parsed by the PHP parser.
There is a performance impact --- if the site is
high traffic you may wish to only parse .php files
and have high-volume pages that don't need dynamic
content in some locations...

phpsys

Hi All,

It works when I add index.php in the <httpd.conf> DirectoryIndex.

Thank you all!

Thanks for your weekend time to help me out!

Ravenous

Glad we could ya' out.