# Index page with no HTML?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 31, 2008, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436 "2008-03-31T19:46:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Will\_Repair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Will_Repair)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2008, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/1 "2008-03-31T19:46:28Z")
Got spam from an outfit calling itself Top American Brands. Just for grins and giggles I went to their web site’s index page. Global Space . com loaded a blank page with no HTML. How is that possible? But www . Global Space .com loaded normally.
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### Author:  [@PaulParkhead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PaulParkhead)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2008, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/2 "2008-03-31T19:49:24Z")
One possible reason - the page is generated dynamically using something like pHp. I get that problem if my pHp code contains an error.
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### Author:  [@Will\_Repair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Will_Repair)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2008, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/3 "2008-03-31T19:51:19Z")
I was thinking something with the server since the www loaded ok.
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### Author:  [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2008, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/4 "2008-03-31T19:52:10Z")
It’s quite possible. “[example.com](http://example.com)” and “[www.example.com](http://www.example.com)” are theoretically two different machines. You can also have “[ftp.example.com](http://ftp.example.com)”, “[boards.example.com](http://boards.example.com)”, and other machines under the [example.com](http://example.com) domain.
Oftentimes, however, the system is configured to route requests for both [www.example.com](http://www.example.com) and [example.com](http://example.com) to the same machine. My web server is set up that way.
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### Author:  [@mks57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mks57)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2008, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/5 "2008-03-31T23:53:07Z")
“www.” has no special meaning. It’s just a convention that web servers use “[www.example.com](http://www.example.com)”. You could use “[fred.example.com](http://fred.example.com)” for a web server and it would work just as well. “[www.example.com](http://www.example.com)” and “[example.com](http://example.com)” are distinct entities.
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### Author:  [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)
#### Post date: [April 1, 2008, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/6 "2008-04-01T00:31:51Z")
The site owner has yet to properly configure the server to render the site with or without the www prefix.
It currently renders as a site under construction. A whois search reveals the site has recently changed hands which would account for the lights on no one home look. The domain was first registered in 1996.
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### Author:  [@Will\_Repair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Will_Repair)
#### Post date: [April 1, 2008, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/index-page-with-no-html/443436/7 "2008-04-01T06:02:37Z")
Thanks **Duckster** , silly me didn’t think of doing a WhoIs search.
I realize that some servers will only respond to wwwdot… while others will respond to just domaindot… In fact I picked my web site host for being able to load with just domaindot and not needing the wwwdot.
Can’t duplicate the results. I tried IE instead of my usual Firefox. Got the full page with IE. Retried Firefox and both loaded. Only difference is the connection - library vs airport.
Will try again later this week.