Imagine you update a file called sidebar.inc that is included in your index.shtml. You upload the new sidebar. You press F5. Nothing changes. You press Ctrl+F5. Still nothing. Why?
Scenario A: Browser Aggressive Caching
Browsers assume that assets like CSS, JS, and even HTML (especially .shtml) don’t change often. Chrome, Firefox, and Edge will store a copy on your hard drive. When you visit the URL, the browser serves the cached copy without even asking the server.
Scenario B: Server-Side Bytecode Cache
Some web servers (especially with modules like mod_cache or through reverse proxies like Varnish) store the output of the SHTML processing. Even if your .shtml file changes, the server serves the old rendered HTML from memory. view shtml updated
Scenario C: The "Included File" Blind Spot
You update an included .html fragment, but the parent .shtml file’s timestamp hasn’t changed. Many servers check the parent file’s last-modified date, not the includes. As far as the server knows, the .shtml file hasn’t been touched, so it sends cached versions.
| Cause | Explanation |
|-------|-------------|
| Server-side caching | The server caches parsed SHTML output |
| Browser cache | Browser serves a stale copy |
| No parent file refresh | Some servers only re-parse SHTML if the main file’s timestamp changed |
| Apache XBitHack off | Without XBitHack full, changes to includes may not trigger re-parsing | Imagine you update a file called sidebar
Add the following directives to disable caching for .shtml files:
<FilesMatch "\.shtml$">
Header set Cache-Control "no-cache, no-store, must-revalidate"
Header set Pragma "no-cache"
Header set Expires 0
</FilesMatch>
Additionally, to solve the included file problem, you need to tell Apache to re-check the parent file when includes change. Use mod_include with the XBitHack option: Additionally, to solve the included file problem, you
XBitHack on
Then, on the command line, make the SHTML file executable:
chmod +x index.shtml
This tells Apache to re-parse the SHTML file every time, ignoring the cache.
Facebook/Post: "Exciting News! 🚀 Our [page/website] has just been updated with fresh content! 📚 Check out the latest developments and updates on [Your Website URL]. Your feedback is invaluable, so let us know what you think! 😊 #Update #NewContent"
Twitter: "🚀 Just updated! Check out the fresh content on our site: [Your Website URL]. Let us know what you think! #websiteupdate #newcontent"
