Files in URI's with no extension...

JaredL

I know this is possible, well from what I have heard anyway, but I've never been able to work out how.

What I want to do basically, is the same thing online applications such as Google and YouTube do to there files, like this:

http://www.google.com/search?q=php

What I am talking about is the "search". So I could turn something like "search.php?find=text" into "search?find=text".

My guess would be it could be done using .htaccess, but no luck so far. Can anyone help me work out this mind-boggle?

Thanks for the help 🙂.

leatherback

Hi,

It is done with a mod_rewrite.
Basically, you place a .htacces (Yes, you are right) in the root of the are you need to rewrite. Apache will trawl through this script and check whether anything needs to be done on the url before getting the right bits and pieces of the server.

Make sure that on your apache config you load the mod_rewrite module (I think you need to adjust this in 2 places) and FOR TESTING you might want to add an mod rewrite log, so you can see the way apache deals with your rules. Set it to error level 5, which should be enough. Switch the log of on your live server, as this grows very large, very quickly (On my site 50-100 lines per page load, depending on no linked items)

an example:

#-- Enable server redirects
  Options +FollowSymLinks

#--  Switch the rewrite module on
  RewriteEngine On

  # condition: Which to process; not required here as you rewrite only this folder
  # However, you might want to use it in other statements
  RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} /search$ [NC]

  # and rewrite
  RewriteRule ^(/search)$ search.php [L]

The way you want to set it up defines the rules, and complexity of the rewites.

When you are doing these things make sure you have a maximum number of rewrites defined in your server, and do not trial these things on your live server, as you may need to reboot the server if you really mess up..

middleman666

Just a quick question about this (sorry for hijacking) - If your with hosting and don't have full control of server options, is there a test you can do to see if this will work?

Say if you had 'index.php?menu=contact' and you wanted it to be just 'contact' would you just use your example?

Also, is there a chance it'll all go bad and my hosting will get angry with me? :S

leatherback

middleman666 wrote:
Just a quick question about this (sorry for hijacking) - If your with hosting and don't have full control of server options, is there a test you can do to see if this will work?

-- Not sure (never tried). Then again.. If you put an .htaccess in your root that rewrites index.php to index2.php and index2.php is served you know it works. Best is to just ask them... I just call my providers in time of need (Like at the moment: Moving between providers; called 4 times today).

#-- Enable server redirects
  Options +FollowSymLinks

#--  Switch the rewrite module on
  RewriteEngine On

  # and rewrite
  RewriteRule ^index.php$ index2.php [L]

middleman666 wrote:
Say if you had 'index.php?menu=contact' and you wanted it to be just 'contact' would you just use your example?

Well.. something like it:
RewriteRule ^/contact$ index.php?menua=contact [L]
I think

middleman666 wrote:
Also, is there a chance it'll all go bad and my hosting will get angry with me?

Yes!
If they have a silly setup you can crash their server!! This is NOT trivial! (Although it would be a good reason to swap providers
:S

middleman666

leatherback wrote:
Well.. something like it:
RewriteRule ^contact$ index.php?menu=contact [L]

thanks for the reply. sorry again to JaredL, but I hope my questions will further help you.

I tried it and it works which is great to know, but now I'm thinking if theres a way to convert some old coding to look a bit smarter. So now what I want is, when someone goes to index.php?menu=contact - I want the address bar to display as '/contact'.

I tried:
RewriteRule ^{index.php?menu=contact$} contact [L]

but that doesn't seem to work, is it because theres a ? and = in the address?

EDIT: sorry, more questions...
What if I had something like:
index.php?user=USERNAME

and I wanted it to be just:
/USERNAME

But, I don't want to have to write out all the RewriteRule's for every user - So, how can I pick the USERNAME from the url and make it redirect to the correct place?

leatherback

Hi Middleman,

Happy to see your enthusiasm..

Please nte that I am a newby with rewrites! I only started a few months ago, and I am waiting for my first fully modrewrite site to go live (Domain transfer should happen any day now!).

The rewrite happens on the URL, not on the query string. So you can match the URL. But I think you are looking for the opposite of what you mention.

You want to rewrite the new urkl:
domain.com/user/name
to
domain.com/user/index.php?user=username
right?

an example:
What I did, is go to a new situation, where I used to pass languages through a query string, and now I do them in the url.
so first I grab catch the links that still use the old system, and externally redirect the page to a new encoded system (So that the address bar shows the correct way to get to the page):

#-- rewrite ?lan=en to /en/
  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} lan=([a-zA-Z]+)
  RewriteRule ^(.*)?$ http://%{SERVER_NAME}/%1/$1?  [R,L]

Further down I internally rewrite that back to the old-style path:


  # Do the rewrite; we go from requested domain/(en|nl)/URI to served: domain/index.php?l=(en|nl)&p=URI
  RewriteRule ^(en/|nl/)?(.*)?$ index.php?l=$1&p=$2 [L]

This in effect is also just for nicety, although in my case it is also required to keep the folders and stuff working ok.

You CAN grab the username, but you need to know that you are looking for a user, e.g., by having the folder user/ after the domain name:
domain.com/user/USERNAME

middleman666

I had a play around with the example code you supplied, but I'm not sure if it's what I want so sorry if I wasn't clear or if I'm just not understanding :S

I also had a look at some tutorias on Mod_Rewrite but I seem to be getting more confused.

On some of my sites I have links on pages that, for example, go to:
http://domainname.net/index.php?menu=contact

Now, I understand that I can use something like this:

RewriteRule ^([^/\.]+)/?$ index.php?menu=$1 [L]

so that I can just type:
http://domainname.net/contact

and I will be taken to the contact page.

What I would like to do is keep the old links in place i.e.
http://domainname.net/index.php?menu=contact

and then by some means of witch craft, I'd like the address in the users address bar to look like this:
http://domainname.net/contact

I'm sorry if you tried to explain this to me in your pevious post and I didn't understand.

Also (a bit off topic), say if I had http://domainname.net/sites/ and sites was an actual directory, could I say something like "if the address is anything in the sites directory then ignore all other rewrites"?

Thanks for your help.

leatherback

hehe, witchcraft.. hehe..

Aagin, realize that I am a beginner on this too. But try something like..

You need to use the CONDITION section of the rewrite:


# Make sure you do not rewrite '/sites' with anything -optionally- following
# by making sure the URI does not start with /sites :
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/sites(/.*)?$ [NC]
rewriterule .... 

# Or better, only rewrite the ones that you want to rewrite:
# Rewrite all URI starting with /contact, possibly ending with slash
# and serve the page index.php?contact

RewriteRule ^/contact(/)?$ /index.php?menu=contact 

# Or possible you want to rewrite ALL pages, except for the sites?:

# Make sure sites are not rewritten (Non case-sensitive)
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/sites(/.*)?$ [NC]

# and rewrite all other URI's
RewriteRule ^(/.*)$ /index.php?menu=$1 [L]

JaredL

Thats for the help leatherback, I'll have a play around with it later today and see if it works.

middleman666 - I know exactly what your wanting to do, I've done it myself in the past, heres the code I used that worked fine:

RewriteRule ^([^/\.]+)/?$ index.php?page=$1 [L]

middleman666

Cheers for that Leatherback, the sites directory is now safe 🙂

JaredL - sorry, that was the code I posted in my previous post, only I used the PHP code window by accident and it seemed to strip away one of the slashes.
- I know how to use that, but it's not what I'm looking for.

I want the user to actualy type this in the address bar:
index.php?menu=contact

But I want it to take them to the contact page and the address to automatically change to:
/contact

Is there a way of doing that?

bradgrafelman

middleman666 wrote:
But I want it to take them to the contact page and the address to automatically change to:
/contact

No need for mod_rewrite... just create index.php :

if(isset($_GET['menu'))
    header('Location: /' . $_GET['menu']);

middleman666

bradgrafelman wrote:
No need for mod_rewrite... just create index.php :
if(isset($_GET['menu']))
    header('Location: ' . $_GET['menu']);
note: added the ] and didn't need the / on location.

That sounds like a great and simple idea, but for some reason it doesn't want to work for me. I've placed it at the very top of the file before any readout, but when I go to:
index.php?menu=contact

It just seems to hang up and not get anywhere.

EDIT:
just noticed when I try to refresh the index.php?menu=contact page, the browsers status flashes rapidly between 'website found. waiting for reply' and 'finding website'....
Could it be that the browser IS redirecting to /contact but then getting confused because the rewrite says if /contact is entered then go to index.php?menu=contact - which in turn starts the whole process again?

leatherback

Sounds to me like you are entering in a vicious loop.

Why do you have the GET and the rewrite?

I presume you want to catch old links, rewrite them to the new format, and then do the internal rewrite? That is exactly the situation I showed in #6

#-- rewrite ?menu=[] to /.. and external redirect
  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} menu=([a-zA-Z]+)
  RewriteRule ^(.*)?$ http://%{SERVER_NAME}/$1/%1?  [R,L]

# Place your new URL rewrite here

middleman666

sorry, I must be driving you crazy...

I didn't understand what was happening in #6, but I think I get what I have to do now.

So, with help from your code I have this:

  RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} menu=([a-zA-Z0-9]+)
  RewriteRule ^(.*)?$ http://%{SERVER_NAME}/%1?  [R,L]

which rewrites http://mydomain.com/index.php?menu=contact
to http://mydomain.com/contact

so now I need a rewrite that takes contact and loads index.php?menu=contact without rewriting contact :S - wouldn't that just put me in a loop again?