6.1 – The start page

Anyone maintaining de/index.md and en/index.md has nothing at /. The plugin writes a small index.html there that redirects:

options:
  rootRedirect: browser
  rememberChoice: true

rootRedirect	What happens
none	nothing (default)
default	always to the default language’s start page
browser	to the visitor’s language, if one fits

Only when the root is free

If an index.md sits directly in the vault, / belongs to it. The plugin does not overwrite it.

How browser decides

In order:

1. The remembered choice — if the visitor has picked a language in the switcher before, that applies.
2. navigator.languages — the browser’s languages, in its order; the first match among the configured ones wins.
3. The default language.

The remembered choice comes first, and that is the point: somebody who once switched to German does not want to land in English on the next visit just because their browser says so.

Switched off with rememberChoice: false — then only the browser language remains.

Without JavaScript

The generated page contains both: a <noscript> with a meta refresh to the default language and a plain list of all language links. Whoever arrives without a script is redirected or can click; the page is never empty.

Redirects are no substitute for content, as far as search engines go

A root that only redirects has nothing to index. Anyone who cares about the start page is better off maintaining a real index.md with hreflang to the language versions.