Posted by Toby Inkster on 07/31/06 06:57

dorayme wrote:

> The things I don't know! I use "this.html" to stay in the same
> directory and "this.html" to really stay in the same directory

You should use "./this.html" to really stay in the same directory.

> and "this.html" to really really stay in the same directory

For that purpose, try "././this.html".

There's also "./././this.html" to really really really stay in the same
directory.

> But I have now learnt something new from you... who would have
> thought one dot would mean something?

Anyone who knows a little about UNIX (and indeed Windows) directory
structure should know that every directory (except the root one) contains
two special subdirectories:

. (a reference back to itself)
.. (a reference to its parent)

so "cd ." does nothing, as does "cd ././.". (The root directory doesn't
contain "..", but does still contain ".".)

The main important use of links starting with "./" is relative linking
from, say:

http://www.example.org/foo/bar.html to
http://www.example.org/foo/

where you'd simply write '<a href="./">Foo</a>'.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me ~ http://tobyinkster.co.uk/contact

[Back to original message]