How do I redirect index.html to the root / ?

[NetPicks]

The site I've inherited had operated on index.html at one point, and now uses index.php for the home page, which goes to the / page. The index.html was lost in migrating server hosts.

How do I redirect the index.html to the / page? I've tried different options that keep giving ending up with the same 404 error. I tried a redirect from index.html to index.php which ended in an infinite loop. Because the index.html no longer exists in the root, should I created it and then add a redirect to it? Can I avoid this by editing the .htaccess?

Any help is appreciated, thanks in advance!

[chrwald]

Hi Pascal,

Try this in you htaccess

RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]{3,9}\ /index.html\ HTTP/

RewriteRule ^index.html$ http://YOURDOMAIN.COM/ [R=301,L]

[USHoleInOne]

Pascal,
chrwald is referring to a 301 redirect, which is safe for seo and should not result in an infinite loop. I've done this myself to redirect the .index.html to the root so that duplicate content would not appear.

[NetPicks]

I pasted the code into my .htaccess, and still receive a 404 for index.html. Must it be placed within module tags? Does the position of placement matter? Thanks for the quick reply, btw.

[chrwald]

Do you allready have some rewrite-rules in yout htaccess? In this case try placing it at the end of them.

Works without any tags for me.

[NetPicks]

I have some re-write rules for Wordpress, which are contained within <ifmodule>tags. And below those I have some redirect 301s. I placed the code after the Wordpress re-writes, and then tried to place them at the end, past the 301 redirects, and still I receive a 404 on the index.html.</ifmodule>

Is there anything else I could be doing? Should I create a new index.html and place a redirect within there?

[chrwald]

The 301 should be outside the <ifmodule>. Maybe you could post the other 301 redirects and the one which isn't working here.</ifmodule>

Creating a new index.html and redirecting from it would give you a 302 or even a meta-redirect, which in regard to seo is not recommended.