html vs. htm

Is their any differences between naming your static pages .html vs. .htm?

Which is better?

Are they equal?

Thanks

 

It doesn't matter. They are equal.

You may have some restrictions on your home page (depends how the server is set up but one of mine would accept index.htm - demanded I use index.html, although it was happy with .htm for all other pages).

 

I agree, they are essentially the same. I personally favor .html over .htm simply because I think .html looks more professional. If I have the choice, I'll go ahead with /pages/like/this/ instead of /pages/like/this.html simply because I like using that style. Neither are better, they are same. A++ Minstrel.

 

I know it is ideal to keep your file structure as flat as possible for the spiders.

Does that mean your link structure or the physical files in your wwwroot diretory?

For example:

wwwroot/articles/a/whatever/article.html

index.php links to article.html

So article.html would be 1 link deep right?

Not 3 deep like it is in the wwwroot directory.

 

Yes. I don't personally like /pages/like/this/ or /pages/like/this.html - personal preference probably but that looks spammy to me.

I agree that I have a preference for html on new sites now - although my oldest site is still mostly htm because that's how it began and I don't want the hassle of redirecting all those pages.

 

I only like /pages/like/this/ because I normally do something like domain.com/info/about/ or something like that, I just like it better, but that's my own opinion. I don't feel it's spammy, just a personal preference. Thanks for your two cents as well, good input minstrel.

 

Oooops I meant to start a new thread on that other question.

Thanks for the responses on the .html vs. .htm

 

Actually, there is some real benefit to the former. It is what is known as cruft-free URLs. The idea is to remove non-essential information. For instance, whether any given page is static HTML, HTML with SSI commands, PHP code, ASP code, etc., is non-essential to the outside world. If a URL path (/info/about) corresponds to a particular file (/public/info-about.html) then you can safely change your pages to PHP (/public/info-about.php) without breaking the original URL path; /info/about would still be the correct path. This way the links on your pages, the links on other people's pages that refer to yours, and the bookmarks stored by visitors will all continue to function.

And for star2323, .html is the more technically correct notation. .htm exists only because ancient operating systems, such as the original DOS, could not handle extensions with more than three characters.

 

Nonsense. It's not a matter of correct or incorrect. They simply are. Either can be used; neither has an advantage over the other.

 

I am a FrontPage user, so FP names everything .htm

Talk about marching to a different drummer. MS has that market cornered.

I agree one is not better than the other.

However, most of the hosts I have used seem to use either index.html or default.html as home page, so I always name my home page index.html and stop worrying about it after that.

BTW I am seriously new here. Would like to wish everyone a safe and happy holiday season.

 

Actually, I believe you can change that if you prefer .html - Adove GoLive also uses htm by default (or used to - haven't tried and don't want to try the most recent versions of that).

 

I also recommend moving away from FrontPage. If I were to use any kind of HTML editor as such, I would use DreamWeaver. Secondly, you can simply rename those files using f2 and rename the file to .html outside of the frontpage editor, you don't need to keep them to .htm if you really want them as .html.

 

Nope, no difference. Between the two I've always named them .html myself.

Or I would if all my files weren't .php now

.

 

no diffrences htm betwen html

 

/pages/like/this/ are much better for branding and user friendliness (sp?!?).

 

Maybe if you stutter...

 

I did not say one has an advantage over the other. Technically correct generally means one is preferred over the other based on a theoretical basis. .htm exists solely because of an old software restriction. That restriction is now long gone, and continuing to use .htm makes as much sense as using a .ph extention for a PHP page, or .as for an ASP page.

 

Okay. Then let me rephrase my reply.

Nonsense. It's not a matter of technically correct or technically incorrect. They simply are. Either can be used; neither has an advantage over the other.

 

It doesn't matter which is used at all. Htm is just shorter. Seems everyone hates M$ (jealous maybe?) so they jump on the html and Firefox bandwagon. Me? When I don't use either, I use folders "/" and php - static pages or not but thats just habit now since I run my sites on php includes.

 

I did not say anything to the contrary. None of this supports your new rephrased sentence either. That both can be used with no practical difference does not subtract from the possibility of one being a more technically correct notation.