RewriteRule works locally, not remotely?

[magarlick]

Hi all

I am having problems getting a RewriteRule to work. Locally, on my Wamp server, the following two work fine:

#Convert URL from /faqs/ to faqs.php
RewriteRule faqs/?$ faqs.php [L]

#Convert URLS from, eg., /faqs/faq1.html to faqs.php?faq=1
RewriteRule faqs/faq([^/\.]+).html faqs.php?faq=$1 [L]

But when I upload them to the live site, the second one does not work. I get a 404. I have tried upmteen variations of it but no luck. Regular expressions are Chinese as far as I am concerned, despite having tried reading the rules many times.

Thanks.

[g1smd]

RewriteRule faqs/?$ faqs.php [L]

The above rule promotes Duplicate Content, allowing URLs with or without a trailing slash to deliver identical content. Serve content only for the URL without slash:

RewriteRule ^faqs$ /faqs.php [L]

RewriteRule faqs/faq([^/\.]+).html faqs.php?faq=$1 [L]

There are several code errors in that rule. Try this:

RewriteRule ^faqs/faq([^.]+)\.html /faqs.php?faq=$1 [L]

Make sure that all of the rewrites are listed AFTER your non-www to www redirect.


Before your non-www to www redirect, add this extra redirect:

RewriteRule ^faqs/$ http://www.example.com/faqs [R=301,L]

This sorts out the Duplicate Content issue mentioned above.

[magarlick]

Thanks for your reply - much appreciated.

Your suggested rewrite of my first rule above works on my remote server (which I think is Linux) but not on my local WAMP server.

Your suggested rewrite of my second rule above works locally but not remotely.

[g1smd]

Have you got any rules that apply to "faqs.php" as part of a requested URL?

[magarlick]

No. Here is the whole file (everything works everywhere except the faqs stuff):

RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /

#Convert URLS from, eg, /artwork/misc/ to gallery.php?gallery=misc
RewriteRule artwork/([^/\.]+)/?$ gallery.php?gallery=$1 [L]

#Convert URLS from, eg, /artwork/misc/smeg.html to image.php?gallery=misc&image=smeg
RewriteRule artwork/([^.]+)/([^.]+).html image.php?gallery=$1&image=$2 [L]

#Convert URLS from /faqs/ to faqs.php
RewriteRule ^faqs$ /faqs.php [L]

#Convert URLS from /faqs/faq1.html to faqs.php?faq=1
RewriteRule ^faqs/faq([^.]+)\.html /faqs.php?faq=$1 [L]


#Convert URLS from, eg, /licensing/prices.html to prices.php
RewriteRule licensing/prices.html prices.php [L]
RewriteRule licensing/info.html info.php [L]
RewriteRule licensing/copyright.html copyright.php [L]

#Convert URLS from index.html to index.php?lang=en, or index_fr.html tp index.php?lang=fr
RewriteRule index.html index.php?lang=en [L]
RewriteRule index.html index.php?lang=fr [L]

#Convert URLS from *.html to *.php
RewriteRule ([^.]+).html $1.php [L]

ErrorDocument 404 /error404.php

<IfModule !mod_php5.c>
AddType x-mapp-php5 .php
</IfModule>

[g1smd]

Add the proper ^start anchor to all RegEx patterns.

Escape literal periods in all RegEx patterns\.

Add the /leading slash to all rule targets. All rule targets.

Your "fr" index rule can never work.

Several other patterns are non-optimum, especially

artwork/([^/\.]+)/?$

(where the

/?

promotes duplicate content and the

.

inside

[^ ]

does not need to be escaped) and

artwork/([^.]+)/([^.]+).html

(the first

[^.]+

doesn't "stop" at the slash).

[magarlick]

Hello again. Thanks for those tips, but it still does not solve my original problem. Despite the errors in the code it all works, locally and remotely, except the two lines dealing with faqs. As I said, your suggestions don't help, as one works locally only and the other remotely only. Can you offer alternative syntax for these two rules, or can you see anything else in the code that would prevent then from working? Thanks.

[g1smd]

Sometimes an error elsewhere has a knock on effect. So it's a good idea to fix all errors even when they don't appear to be causing a problem. At least one of the code errors leaves your server wide open to malicious path injection techniques.

[lucy24]

Your "fr" index rule can never work.

I think it's a typo and he meant to say

RewriteRule index_fr.html index.php?lang=fr [L]

or rather

RewriteRule index_fr.html /index.php?lang=fr [L]

Escape literal periods in all RegEx patterns\.

Except inside brackets, as in your first rule in the most recent post. Within grouping brackets, nothing needs to be escaped except spaces and parentheses (which might occur in a Cond but never in a Rule) and brackets (which should never occur anyway).

[g1smd]

or rather

RewriteRule ^index_fr\.html$ /index.php?lang=fr [L]

(4 changes)

In particular omitting the start or end anchor allows infinite duplicate content.