Conflict: index and try_files

[Maxim Dounin]

Hello!

On Fri, Nov 18, 2011 at 09:39:05AM -0500, janedenone wrote:

> In the following simple configuration
> 
> server {
> 	server_name testsite.static;
> 	root /some/path/;
> 	index blog.html;
> 	try_files $uri $uri.html =404;
> }
> 
> the try_files directive seems to interfere with the index directive: I
> always get 404 for http://testsite.static/.

If you want try_files to test directories as well (and to allow 
index directive to work), you have to explicitly specify "/" at 
the end of name.  I.e. use something like this:

   try_files $uri/ $uri $uri.html =404;

> If I remove the fallback
> part of try_files, the same request results in an error:

If you remove "=404" from the above try_files, it will become

    try_files $uri $uri.html;

i.e. if no file $uri found, it will redirect to $uri.html (/.html) 
in your case.  In it's turn it won't be found and will again 
redirect to $uri.html (/.html.html now).  The

>  *990 rewrite or internal redirection cycle while internal redirect to
> "/.html.html.html....

is expected.

> The file blog.html is present in /some/path/, so I really do not
> understand why the file is not found/served for the above URL.

That's because it tests for files, and rejects directories by 
default.  Test for directories must by explicitly requested.

See here for more information:

http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_core_module.html#try_files

Maxim Dounin