document whose type cannot be determined by its <glossary
ref="mime-type">MIME types</glossary> mappings.</p>
- <p>The server must inform the client of the content-type of the
- document, so in the event of an unknown type it uses the
+ <p>The server SHOULD inform the client of the content-type of the
+ document. If the server is unable to determine this by normal
+ means, it will set it to the configured
<code>DefaultType</code>. For example:</p>
<example>
<p>would be appropriate for a directory which contained many GIF
images with filenames missing the <code>.gif</code> extension.</p>
- <p>Sometimes it may be better to omit the MIME type altogether if it
- cannot be determined by the server. This can be accomplished using</p>
+ <p>In cases where it can neither be determined by the server nor
+ the administrator (e.g. a proxy), it is preferable to omit the MIME
+ type altogether rather than provide information that may be false.
+ This can be accomplished using</p>
<example>
DefaultType None
</example>
<p>DefaultType None is only available in httpd-2.2.7 and later.</p>
- <p>This can be suppressed by setting <code>DefaultType None</code>.
- With this setting, Apache will omit <em>any</em> Content-Type
- header if it not able to determine the correct MIME type.</p>
-
<p>Note that unlike <directive
module="core">ForceType</directive>, this directive only
provides the default mime-type. All other mime-type definitions,