.htaccess 301 redirect

[web_young]

I'm new to .htaccess and need to know how to 301 redirect this page:

/layout9.asp?id=322&page=8978

to this page:

/index.php/panther-lake-course-information

Any help is greatly appreciated.

[wildbest]

# MOD_ALIAS PERMANENT REDIRECT #
Redirect 301 /layout9.asp?id=322&page=8978 http://www.example.com/index.php/panther-lake-course-information

But... are you sure your .asp pages are hosted on Apache server?

[web_young]

No, the site is being redesigned and converted from .asp to .php, does the page have to actually exist on the server?

Thanks for your help.

[web_young]

wildbest, i tried your code but it didn't work, is that because the .asp page doesn't exist on the server?

[wildbest]

You can use .htaccess file only on Apache web server.

[web_young]

Yes, the new site is on an apache server, but the old asp files don't exist on the new server. Can I still do a htaccess redirect in this situation?

[wildbest]

Yes, you can.

to this page:

/index.php/panther-lake-course-information

I don't see a page there.
Do you actually mean?
/panther-lake-course-information/index.php

[web_young]

wildbest your code works if I take the URL variables out, but how can I do it with the url variables?

[wildbest]

RedirectMatch 301 ^/layout9\.asp\?id=322&amppage=8978$ http://www.example.com/panther-lake-course-information/index.php

[Caterham]

but how can I do it with the url variables?

As the documentation [httpd.apache.org] states

mod_alias is designed to handle simple URL manipulation tasks. For more complicated tasks such as manipulating the query string, use the tools provided by mod_rewrite.

You can't check for an existing query_string with mod_alias. You can only substitute a new one.

You'll need a RewriteCond checking for %{QUERY_STRING}, the pattern of the RewriteRule directive matches against a local filepath in per-directory context. See the documentation [httpd.apache.org] for more details.

[edited by: Caterham at 9:11 pm (utc) on Jan. 6, 2009]

[jdMorgan]

mod_alias isn't so good about seeing query strings attached to the URL. If the above does not work, try mod_rewrite:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
#
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^id=322&page=8978$
RewriteRule ^layout9\.asp$ http://www.example.com/panther-lake-course-information/index.php? [R=301,L]

You may or may not need the first line (Options) on your hosting account, but only testing can tell you for sure.

Jim

[web_young]

Thank you all for your help! jdMorgan, that did the trick. Thanks again!

[wildbest]

I'm always trying to avoid using mod_rewrite if simple redirect tasks can be solved by mod_alias Redirect or RedirectMatch.

[Caterham]

I'm always trying to avoid using mod_rewrite if simple redirect tasks can be solved by mod_alias Redirect or RedirectMatch.

Which you should always do (KISS [en.wikipedia.org]). But unfortunately none directive provided by mod_alias can check r->args but only r->uri.

[wildbest]

RedirectMatch

The supplied regular expression is matched against the URL-path.

mod_alias is designed to handle simple URL manipulation tasks. For more complicated tasks such as manipulating the query string, use the tools provided by mod_rewrite.

That's what mod_alias documentation says. So yes, you're correct. Obviously, just checking the query string is already kind of manipulation!

[g1smd]

You should not mix directives from Mod_Alias (

Redirect

and

RedirectMatch

) with directives from Mod_Rewrite (

RewriteRule

) within the same .htaccess file, because you cannot guarantee the order in which they will be processed.

In view of that, I only ever use

RewriteRule

for redirects and rewrites.

[jdMorgan]

The point is that a query string is not part of a URL (or URI) -- It is data *attached* to the URL to be passed to the resource (e.g. script) *at* that URL.

Another way to look at it is that a URL *locates* a resource on the Web. The query string plays no part in the location of the script, and is therefore not part of the URL.

mos_alias was written when dynamic Web sites were very rare or non-existent, and all (or most) based on primitive server-side includes (see mod_includes).

Jim