mod_rewrite failure with PHP site

RyanMinor

I know this is a PHP forum, but I am completely lost as to why I cannot get mod_rewrite to give me SEO friendly URL's with my PHP website. I called GoDaddy and confirmed that mod_rewrite is enabled and turned on. I then copied a simple RewriteRule to send all requests to drupal.org and that worked. Now, I try to get my RewriteRules to work but everything I try fails. My .htaccess is placed in the same directory as the files it is dealing with. Below is what I have in my .htaccess file:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> 

RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^modelinfo/model/(.*)/$ modelinfo.php?model=$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^modelinfo/model/(.*)$ modelinfo.php?model=$1 [L]

</IfModule>

Let's say the URL that I am trying to clean up is: http://www.website.com/modelinfo.php?model=Model_Name (this is exactly what the URL looks like now) and I want it to say http://www.website.com/modelinfo/Model_Name. Can anybody help me out as I have just wasted 3+ hours on this. Thanks in advance!

bradgrafelman

The URL http://www.website.com/modelinfo/Model_Name won't match either of the two RewriteRule's you have (which could be reduced to a single rule - more about that in a bit). The URL http://www.website.com/modelinfo/model/Model_Name , however, would match the second rule.

Speaking of that pesky second rule, get rid of it and add a question mark after the '/' character in the first rule. In regular expression syntax, a bare question mark means that the preceding entity (just a single character in this case) may appear either 0 or 1 times (in other words: it's optional).

RyanMinor

Thanks for the reply. I will give it a shot when I get home from the office.

RyanMinor

bradgrafelman;10981944 wrote:
The URL http://www.website.com/modelinfo/Model_Name won't match either of the two RewriteRule's you have (which could be reduced to a single rule - more about that in a bit). The URL http://www.website.com/modelinfo/model/Model_Name , however, would match the second rule.

Speaking of that pesky second rule, get rid of it and add a question mark after the '/' character in the first rule. In regular expression syntax, a bare question mark means that the preceding entity (just a single character in this case) may appear either 0 or 1 times (in other words: it's optional).

I tried this and am still unable to get the .htaccess to work. Any other suggestions.

bradgrafelman

What do you mean by "this" ? What have you tried? If you changed your RewriteRules, then post a new copy of what you've got now.

RyanMinor

bradgrafelman;10982025 wrote:
What do you mean by "this" ? What have you tried? If you changed your RewriteRules, then post a new copy of what you've got now.

Here is my new .htaccess that I tried after your suggestion:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^modelinfo/model/(.*)/?$ modelinfo.php?model=$1 [L]

bradgrafelman

Worked fine for me with a URL such as:

http://localhost/modelinfo/model/brad

Try adding an invalid line in the .htaccess and see if you get an 'Internal Server Error' page returned (that way we can make sure your .htaccess file is being parsed by Apache).

RyanMinor

Can you post some of the code you used because everything I try will not work. Or I could just post all of my code for you to look at.

bradgrafelman;10982050 wrote:
Worked fine for me with a URL such as:
http://localhost/modelinfo/model/brad
Try adding an invalid line in the .htaccess and see if you get an 'Internal Server Error' page returned (that way we can make sure your .htaccess file is being parsed by Apache).

bradgrafelman

There's really no code to look at other than what you've already posted. All I did was copy and paste the two Rewrite lines into my .htaccess file and then created a 'modelinfo.php' file in the root of my test site that contained nothing but:

<?php
var_dump($_GET);

for testing purposes.

The content of the PHP script (or any other file you want to redirect to) is irrelevant (at least, it is to the issue at hand).

EDIT: If it's not working for you, can you post the relevant lines of Apache's error/access logs that correspond to the requests you're trying? Also, did you try the invalid line test I suggested above?

RyanMinor

Can you give me an example of an invalid line to test with?

bradgrafelman;10982138 wrote:
There's really no code to look at other than what you've already posted. All I did was copy and paste the two Rewrite lines into my .htaccess file and then created a 'modelinfo.php' file in the root of my test site that contained nothing but:
<?php
var_dump($_GET);
for testing purposes.

The content of the PHP script (or any other file you want to redirect to) is irrelevant (at least, it is to the issue at hand).

EDIT: If it's not working for you, can you post the relevant lines of Apache's error/access logs that correspond to the requests you're trying? Also, did you try the invalid line test I suggested above?

bradgrafelman

Um... sure, here's one:

asdjghaouhgaulighalwighalwugha7hlieuanlbiuanbailuhbp4798gyhalirgbhal47gihnul4.uihan;rhguiap9784hgoa;urgjnarekbalkrgjhaliegujnk34ghloaiurghluijgahl;ruianhruiabh;rgaurebgha;luirjbvngpw598ughp89ap8hjgaleri854g79a43

sneakyimp

bradgrafelman;10982179 wrote:

Um... sure, here's one:

asdjghaouhgaulighalwighalwugha7hlieuanlbiuanbailuhbp4798gyhalirgbhal47gihnul4.uihan;rhguiap9784hgoa;urgjnarekbalkrgjhaliegujnk34ghloaiurghluijgahl;ruianhruiabh;rgaurebgha;luirjbvngpw598ughp89ap8hjgaleri854g79a43

😃

Here's another:

ooogabooogaooogaboogaTHISWILLNOTWORKROFLMAO

RyanMinor

When I put the invalid line into the .htaccess as a RewriteRule i got an Internal Server Error.

sneakyimp

Is there other stuff in your .htaccess file? Is your .htaccess file in your web root or is it in a subfolder (e.g., the "modelinfo" directory) ?

Usually, if I have problems with mod_rewrite files, I try to create a file like brad says:

<?php
print_r($_GET);
die();
?>

Then I start with a simple mod_rewrite rule:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ somefile.php?match=$1 [L]

That usually helps you see if it's working at a basic level or not because you should be referred to your file and the contents of $_GET['match'] will have the entire bit from your RewriteRule.

Then you can add stuff little by little to make it more specific.

Another option is to set a mod_rewrite log file and monitor its contents to see what is matching and what isn't.

RyanMinor

The only code in my .htaccess file is below:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^modelinfo/model/(.*)/?$ modelinfo.php?model=$1 [L]

The .htaccess file is also in my web root which is where the modelinfo.php page is located. It get its URL parameter from models.php which is also in my web root. I do have another .htaccess file located in the members folder that controls member access, but since it is in another directory it shouldn't be a factor, right?

sneakyimp;10982261 wrote:
Is there other stuff in your .htaccess file? Is your .htaccess file in your web root or is it in a subfolder (e.g., the "modelinfo" directory) ?

Usually, if I have problems with mod_rewrite files, I try to create a file like brad says:
<?php
print_r($_GET);
die();
?>
Then I start with a simple mod_rewrite rule:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ somefile.php?match=$1 [L]
That usually helps you see if it's working at a basic level or not because you should be referred to your file and the contents of $_GET['match'] will have the entire bit from your RewriteRule.

Then you can add stuff little by little to make it more specific.

Another option is to set a mod_rewrite log file and monitor its contents to see what is matching and what isn't.

sneakyimp

The rewrite rule you are shooting for should only apply to url requests that start with modelinfo. Your members subdir would probably not be affected by this because it starts with "members" and not "modelinfo", right?

The real question is whether your rewrite rule fails to match because apache is trying to match something starting with "modelinfo" against something that actually starts with "/modelinfo". I suggest you make a backup of your .htaccess file and then create one like my suggestion.

bradgrafelman

For a test that more closely mimics what you're trying to (yet also covers the possible issue sneakyimp is referring to), you could also try removing the '^' and '$' start-of- and end-of-string matches from your RewriteRule.

Also, what does "will not work" mean (other than nothing; we know it's not working.. that's why you're here, after all 🙂)? As I requested before, doing this:

bradgrafelman;10982138 wrote:
If it's not working for you, can you post the relevant lines of Apache's error/access logs that correspond to the requests you're trying?

will at least help us confirm that the rewrite rule isn't getting matched (e.g. you're getting a 404 error because Apache is trying to find a file that corresponds to the URL instead of rewriting the request first).

sneakyimp

As brad points out, removing ^ and $ might help -- these assertions are themselves characters but they assert that the "start" and "end" of the thing to be matched appear where they are listed. removing them would mean that the other stuff you're trying to match could occur anywhere in the request rather than right at the start.

the suggestion I gave with that very simple rewrite rule was intended to help you determine exactly what request is being made so you can more carefully construct the exact pattern you need.

RyanMinor

I tried removing ^ and $ and it still went to the page (successfully) with www.website.com/modelinfo.php/model/Model_Name in the URL. Surprisingly, there is nothing in the error logs either. I don't get it.

My link from models.php is:
<a href="modelinfo.php?model=<?php echo $model; ?>"
where $model = str_replace(' ', '_', stripslashes($dataModels['modelname']));

sneakyimp

I'm confused now. "it still went successfully" ? I thought your rewrite wasn't working. You need to be more precise about describing your problem. The urls you visit, the .htaccess file contents, the url you actually access, the output.

And for now, I would focus on the rewrite issue if I were you. Later, I would remember how the rewrite rule works and make sure my links in my site are correct. I don't see any point in having the rewrite rule if your entire site links directly to modelinfo.php instead of using your SEO-friendly URLS like http://www.website.com/modelinfo.php/model/Model_Name