.htaccess files

[OnlineAssetPartners]

I am working with a clients website which has multiple htaccess files (.htaccess , .htaccess.holiding, and .htaccess.live -all in the same directory)

My question is how does a server process these files? All 3 files?

Currently the domain has 301 redirect showing for the home page to the mobile site (which is a problem) in one of the files (.htaccess but not others)

Has anyone come across this before with regard to SEO problems?

[benjaminspak]

No, this is new to me. But this might help:

.htaccess: how do multiple .htaccess files work?

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7892921/htaccess-how-do-multiple-htaccess-files-work

[GeorgeAndrews]

On your web server there is a configuration file that ends in ".conf". This file will have settings for the virtual host, it will look something like this:

<virtualhost></virtualhost>

ServerAdmin     webmaster@example.com

DocumentRoot    /var/www/html/example.com/public_html/

ServerName      example.com

ServerAlias     www.example.com

AccessFileName .htaccess

The web server should only be using a single .htaccess file. The value for the AccessFileName will identify which .htaccess file your server is using. The other files (.htaccess.holding and .htaccess.live) look like they may have been previous versions of your current .htaccess file.

Whichever file is located in this configuration file is the one you will need to edit to fix your issue. From my perspective, you should then be able to delete the other .htaccess files if you want to. You could choose to save a backup in case you feel you may ever need them in the future.

Hope this helps!

[JamesFx]

Guess, those are just backups of the htaccess file...