The problem seems to be with Safari. For example, in Safari, if I type http://192.168.4.10/, i get:

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In Internet Explorer, typing the same URL as above, I get the proper web page showing up [the one I created, index.html.

Very interesting. I'm using v74 of Safari. I can duplicate this on my other Mac as well. I'm running 10.2.6.

In reply to hayne's point about this being *very weird*:
I totally agree. But I thought of one reason for why switching browsers worked: a caching problem in the older version. If it was incorrectly hanging on to old versions of the pages (ie a Forbidden page, or the apache install page, or whatever), Safari might've been improperly assuming that those versions were current, and not actually reloading the new file--despite the old one not being there anymore. So apache is not necessarily at fault...

Might be limited to sites in the Rendezvous listing (I remember a .local reference somewhere in the thread), might have been global--I run 10.1 and wouldn't know. But that's a possible explanation.

Joe

caches
 

Yes, thanks aixccapt99, this is indeed likely to have been a caching problem.
When testing out your own web ste, it is often necessary to clear the browser's cache in order to see the effect of changes. If you see something "weird" happening, this is a strong sign that you should clear the cache before going further in your investigation. Safari makes this easy by having an "Empty Cache" menu item but for most other browsers you need to do this via Preferences, sometimes in the "Advanced" section.