如何使用htaccess重写规则简化PHP网站URL？

Question

I have this site made from the developer in PHP and now all the pages have this URL structure,

websitename.com/software.php?name=product_name

The only thing which changes every time on various pages on site is only the "product name" such as:

websitename.com/software.php?name=product_name1

websitename.com/software.php?name=product_name2

websitename.com/software.php?name=product_name3

etc

I only want to have URL like this:

websitename.com/product_name1

websitename.com/product_name2

websitename.com/product_name3 and so on..

can you please tell me what code should I be adding on my htaccess in order to get such URL structure.

Answer 1

For websitename.com/any to websitename.com/software.php?name=any use this rules in top of yours .htaccess file

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
    RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /software.php?name=$1 [L]
</IfModule>

But more usefull URL structure (software only for products) would be websitename.com/software/any-product-name to websitename.com/software.php?name=any-product-name

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
    RewriteRule ^software\/(.*)$ /software.php?name=$1 [L]
</IfModule>

For SEO friendly URLs use "-" instead of "_" in product names.

Answer 2

This should point you into the right direction:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^/?(.*)$ /software.php?name=$1 [END]

In case you receive an internal server error (http status 500) using the rule above then chances are that you operate a very old version of the apache http server. You will see a definite hint to an unsupported [END] flag in your http servers error log file in that case. You can either try to upgrade or use the older [L] flag, it probably will work the same in this situation, though that depends a bit on your setup.

This rule will work likewise in the http servers host configuration or inside a dynamic configuration file (".htaccess" file). Obviously the rewriting module needs to be loaded inside the http server and enabled in the http host. In case you use a dynamic configuration file you need to take care that it's interpretation is enabled at all in the host configuration and that it is located in the host's DOCUMENT_ROOT folder.

And a general remark: you should always prefer to place such rules in the http servers host configuration instead of using dynamic configuration files (".htaccess"). Those dynamic configuration files add complexity, are often a cause of unexpected behavior, hard to debug and they really slow down the http server. They are only provided as a last option for situations where you do not have access to the real http servers host configuration (read: really cheap service providers) or for applications insisting on writing their own rules (which is an obvious security nightmare).

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UPDATE: In the comment below you ask in addition to redirect a request to the original, not rewritten URL. Here is an extended version doing that:

RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (?:^|&)name=([^&]+)(?:&|$)
RewriteRule ^/?software\.php$ /%1 [R=301]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^/?(.*)$ /software.php?name=$1 [END]

It is a good idea to start out with a 302 temporary redirection and only change that to a 301 permanent redirection later, once you are certain everything is correctly set up. That prevents caching issues while trying things out...