# Web Address
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [April 23, 2003, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665 "2003-04-23T19:19:45Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@TJ555\_The\_Golfer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJ555_The_Golfer)
#### Post date: [April 23, 2003, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665/1 "2003-04-23T19:19:45Z")
I have a question. A website might have the address:
[www.fakeaddress.net/pictures/houses](http://www.fakeaddress.net/pictures/houses)
Now, it might have /houses and /boats and /lakes
If there is no list shown on the site of the all the different catagories is there a way to determine what all the /x’s are without typing in words hit or miss?
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [April 23, 2003, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665/2 "2003-04-23T19:29:02Z")
Only if there’s no index file in the target parent directory, or if the site owners allow anonymous FTP access. If an index is not present you’ll see a directory listing showing all the files and subfolders. For purposes of security, _every_ publicly accessible folder on a site should have an index, even a blank one, but sometimes you’ll find sites that don’t have them.
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### Author:  [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)
#### Post date: [April 23, 2003, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665/3 "2003-04-23T19:46:31Z")
Two possibilities to try and get a list of URLs in a site:
- use a link checkling spider like [Xenu’s Link Sleuth](http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html) (impolite to use it on someone else’s site with a hight thread limit)
- Google for **site:www.fakedaddress.net _dummyterm_** , choosing a word that should appear on all pages for _dummyterm_
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### Author:  [@chorizo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorizo)
#### Post date: [April 23, 2003, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-address/170665/4 "2003-04-23T19:55:03Z")
It depends on how the webserver is set up.
If a site uses Apache, if there is an index.html file in a directory, or another file with the name that Apache is configured to use as the index file, you cannot see the listing of a directory. If there is no index file, you will be able to see a listing of everything in the directory.
For example, if you go to [http://www.fakeaddress.com/](http://www.fakeaddress.com/), you’ll be given the index.html file. But if they have an images directory at [http://www.fakeaddress.com/images/](http://www.fakeaddress.com/images/), chances are there isn’t an index.html file in that directory. You might be able to see a listing of everything in that directory.
Of course, a lot of people don’t want you to be able to do this, so they will configure Apache without the “Indexes” option, it will deny you the ability to see the contents of a directory that does not have an index.html file. This is usually in the configuration file by default so you have to go out of your way to disable directory content listings, but most people do.
I have no idea how it’s done with IIS.