Options directive
Syntax: Options [+|-]option [[+|-]option] ...
Context: server config, virtual host, directory, .htaccess
Override: Options
Status: core

The Options directive controls which server features are available in a particular directory.

option can be set to None, in which case none of the extra features are enabled, or one or more of the following:

FollowSymLinks
The server will follow symbolic links in this directory.
Note: even though the server follows the symlink it does not change the pathname used to match against <Directory> sections.
Note: this option gets ignored if set inside a <Location> section.

A symbolic link (often symlink, especially in verb form, or soft link) is a special type of directory entry in modern Unix (or Unix-like) filesystems that allows to almost transparently refer to another directory entry, typically a file or a directory.

The RewriteBase directive explicitly sets the base URL for per-directory rewrites. As you will see below, RewriteRule can be used in per-directory config files (.htaccess). There it will act locally, i.e., the local directory prefix is stripped at this stage of processing and your rewriting rules act only on the remainder. At the end it is automatically added back to the path.