In the admin area, the WP menu to the left links to index.php for the dashboard

[Denis-de-Bernardy]

It goes <a href="index.php" …. Could we make it prettier and use <a href="./" instead?

[nacin]

The entire admin menu uses just relative URLs, not just index.php. Why does this matter?

[Denis-de-Bernardy]

Replying to nacin:

The entire admin menu uses just relative URLs, not just index.php. Why does this matter?

It's prettier and more consistent:

• from the front-end, you see the url you're going to as example.com/wp-admin/
• from the back-end, you see the url you're going to as example.com/wp-admin/index.php

Changing that from index.php to ./ in the menu code would make the two show as example.com/wp-admin/.

I'll supply the patch for you to see if you're interested (I'm resorting to js in the meanwhile.) Else, just close as wontfix.

[nacin]

Sorry, I had read this as you wanting it to be "./index.php", versus "./". I've never seen "./" used to be honest. admin_url( '/ ) could be used instead, I gather.

[Denis-de-Bernardy]

Something like the patch I just attached.

[knutsp]

+1

This has been an annoyance, but small, for a too long time now. It was my first little disappointment with WordPress, as "Why do I see this 'index.php' in the admin internal links?".

Never ever link to index.php explicitly, partly because it looks like duplicate content (and other reasons).

./ is the correct relative URL to the index of the current directory.

[Denis-de-Bernardy]

Alternative means to do this using a drop-in plugin in the meanwhile:

add_filter('parent_file', function($parent) {
    ob_start(function($buffer) {
        $buffer = str_replace(array(
            "href='index.php'", 'href="index.php"'
        ), array(
            "href='./'", 'href="./"'
        ), $buffer);
        return $buffer;
    });
    return $parent;
});

add_action('adminmenu', function() {
    ob_end_flush();
});

[wonderboymusic]

index.php appears all over the logic for the admin menus - not just the href, the relative url is what is hooked to add submenus. Removing it would actually confuse things. I see this change as being too trivial, sorry.