head -n 20 index.shtml The head command displays the first 20 lines (the "top") of the file. You will see the raw SSI directives, not the rendered HTML. To see what the server actually sends to the browser (post-parsing), use curl :
curl http://yoursite.com/index.shtml | head -n 50 This executes the SSI on the server and shows you the top 50 lines of the final output. In some high-traffic legacy systems, an SHTML file might be generated dynamically by a script. You could use the Linux top command to see if the process parsing your SHTML is consuming too many resources (CPU/memory), suggesting the "top" of the file has a broken include loop. Chapter 4: Debugging Common "Top" Issues in SHTML If you have tried to view shtml top and see raw code instead of a navigation bar, you have a problem. Here is the debugging checklist. Issue A: The Top Navigation is Missing Symptoms: The top of the webpage is blank. Check: Open the SHTML file. Look at the top 10 lines. view shtml top
But what does "view shtml top" actually mean? Is it a command, a code snippet, or a troubleshooting step? head -n 20 index
| Feature | SHTML (SSI) | Modern PHP/Python | Static Site Generators (SSG) | | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | | | Every page request | Every request (or cached) | Build time only | | Top Nav example | <!--#include --> | <?php include('top.php');?> | % include 'top.html' % (Jekyll/Hugo) | | Performance | Slow (disk I/O per request) | Moderate (opcode caching) | Fastest (pure HTML) | | Best for | Legacy intranets | Dynamic apps | Blogs, marketing sites | In some high-traffic legacy systems, an SHTML file