Unable to set managed paths to Explicit inclusion (root) SharePoint 2010

Question

I am simply attempting to create a new web application with a site collection that follows the Explicit inclusion (root) convention. No matter which Managed Paths mapping I select the Site Collection defaults to the Wildcard inclusion ("/SitePages/").

What am I doing wrong? I deleted the web application and associated content database. I then recreated the web application and site collection and set the Managed path to Explicit inclusion (root). I would like the URL to resemble the following: "http://contoso/default.aspx".

Answer 1

You aren't doing anything wrong, that is how it works in 2010. Site Pages is the document library holding the home page, it isn't a managed path.

After creation, navigate to the default.aspx page and then in the Page ribbon tab, there is a button called Make Homepage. Click it, and default.aspx will be the new home page, like how it was in newly provisioned 2007 sites.