It is possible and even beneficial, reason: search engines will consider this aliasing more highly.
This is an Apache or Web Server issue, not php. You'll need to do either a custom ErrorDocument 404 call inside a <Directory> wrapper or I believe what's called <LocationMatch> in httpd.conf.
I'm a Linux guy so NO IDEA how to do in Windows.
Then you'll need to read the path, parse it, and treat the components as variables:
//sample: mysite.com/news/rececent/florida/
$result=explode('/',$PHP_SELF);
//you have this set by convention
$topic=$result[1]; //"news"
$category=$result[2]; // "recent"
$subCategory=$result[3]; // "florida"
so the outside user thinks its a "real" url, but any url actually goes to a single index file.
This system is also good becuase it cuts down on disk reads (you're only reading the root index.php file for any call, not many many files).
I'm in the process of developing this myself, PM me and though it may be weeks away I'd be glad to share what I know.
Sincerely,
SAm Fullman
