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I am a noob looking for some help. I inherited a website with some Symlinks settings in the .htaccess file but i dont know anything about the. I tried google but I can't figure it out. If anyone can give some help as to what the following is doing I will appreciate it:

# For security reasons, Option followsymlinks cannot be overridden.
#Options +FollowSymLinks
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
# For security reasons, Option all cannot be overridden.
#Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch All -Indexes
Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI  Includes  IncludesNOEXEC  SymLinksIfOwnerMatch  Indexes -Indexes
Edited by aads because: n/a
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Dani AI

Generated

As already noticed, lines beginning with # are comments and do nothing; Apache only acts on the uncommented Options directive. The file you posted looks like a messy / duplicated edit (or a control-panel template) rather than intentional configuration. In many shared-host setups you cannot override certain Options from .htaccess — if that is the case the server simply ignores the line and will typically log an error such as "Options not allowed here" (see Apache Options and AllowOverride docs for details).

Briefly, the tokens in that Options line control different features:

  • The "symlink" setting chooses whether Apache follows symbolic links unconditionally or only when the symlink and its target share an owner (the latter is safer on multi-user hosts).
  • ExecCGI enables CGI execution.
  • Includes / IncludesNOEXEC enable server-side includes (NOEXEC prevents SSI exec commands).
  • Indexes / -Indexes turn directory listings on or off.

For reference, Apache’s Options/AllowOverride documentation is authoritative: Options directive and AllowOverride. SSI behavior is covered by mod_include docs: mod_include.

Practical steps: back up the .htaccess, remove the duplicated/garbled lines and keep only the options you actually need (or remove the whole line if your host blocks Options). To test SSI, create a small SHTML file containing this and request it from the browser:

<!--#echo var="DATE_LOCAL" -->

If it prints the date, Includes are working. Check the Apache error log for "Options not allowed here" when experimenting. On shared hosting, ask the provider to change vhost config rather than forcing Options in .htaccess. Keep .htaccess minimal and only enable ExecCGI/FollowSymLinks when absolutely necessary.

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I realize that every line starting with # is a comment but I'm not sure if there is any other purpose.

The only line that is not commented out is this:

Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI Includes IncludesNOEXEC SymLinksIfOwnerMatch ExecCGI  Includes  IncludesNOEXEC  SymLinksIfOwnerMatch  Indexes -Indexes
Edited by aads because: n/a
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