What's the importance of htaccess, where is it located, and how do I know if mine is correct?

Question

I've never worked with an htaccess file and so I'm not sure if I have anything correct in it and I'm not sure if I'm supposed to have one.

I've looked up some documentation and there hasn't been much help. Is it essential to running an apache server to include an htaccess file?

Answer 1

What’s the importance of htaccess

It lets you configure a web server on a per-directory basis without restarting the server

where is it located

In the directory you want it to apply to

and how do I know if mine is correct?

It does what you want it to do (which could be any number of a huge number of different things) without filling your log files full of errors.

Is it essential to running an apache server to include an htaccess file?

Some other webservers also support htaccess.

Is it possible to fix broken links using the .htaccess file?

Define "Fix". Server configuration certainly can't make deleted content reappear.

Answer 2

I've used htaccess on apache servers to password-control the content of a website.

There's a tutorial here: http://www.freewebmasterhelp.com/tutorials/htaccess/3

Answer 3

The Apache Tutorial seems clear enough to me...

To fix broken links, you could use mod_rewrite.