rewrite engine for php app

Question

I'm trying to create simple rewrite engine to make my urls more beautifull. Currently I'm using this:

    RewriteEngine on
    RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)/?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]*)?/?$ index.php?controller=$1&action=$2&id=$3 [NC,L]

So when i enter this url:

www.domain.com/fooo/bar/foobar

i will gete from php:

    Array
    (
        [controller] => fooo
        [action] => bar
        [id] => foobar
    )

I want to update this rewrite rule, so when after domain part of url is starting with 2-3chars it will create different array, like this:

from www.domain.com/eng/fooo/bar/foobar

Array
(
    [lang] => eng
    [controller] => fooo
    [action] => bar
    [id] => foobar
)

I created new rule:

    RewriteEngine on
    RewriteRule ^([a-z]{2,3})/?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]*)?/?$ index.php?lang=$1&controller=$2&action=$3&id=$4 [NC,L]
    RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)/?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]*)?/?$ index.php?controller=$1&action=$2&id=$3 [NC,L]

but when i enter www.mydomain.com/english/foo/bar/foobar

it gives me:

    Array
    (
        [lang] => eng
        [controller] => lish
        [action] => foo
        [id] => bar/foobar
    )

but I'm expecting

    Array
    (
        [controller] => english
        [action] => foo
        [id] => bar/foobar
    )

because of word "english" being longer than 3chars.

Can someone help me fix this? Thanks!

Answer 1

Your new rule has an optional / ( /? ), so will happily match something which has three letters - ([az]{2,3}) - followed directly by some more letters - ([a-zA-Z0-9_]*) .

In fact, you have ? s and * all over the place in those rules, when as far as I can see you want to check that things are there, not just that they might be .

Try removing the ? s, and switching to + (1 or more) instead of * (0 or more):

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^([a-z]{2,3})/([a-zA-Z0-9_]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9_]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]+)/$ index.php?lang=$1&controller=$2&action=$3&id=$4 [NC,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z0-9_]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9_]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]+)/$ index.php?controller=$1&action=$2&id=$3 [NC,L]

If you want to match patterns where only some of the parts are present (eg URLs with 2 parts, not 3 or 4) then simply add separate rules for those.

(As an aside, the form ([some-range]*)? is redundant anyway, as the * means "0 or more in the range", and the ? means "0 or 1 instances of preceding group" - so you have "0 or 1 instances of a group of 0 or more".)

Answer 2

You could use a non capturing group on your first {2,3} block like this to ensure it matches your {2,3} requirement followed by a slash..

(?:([a-z]{2,3})/)?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9_]*)?/?([a-zA-Z0-9\-_/]*)?/?

Group 1 will always contain your two/three character match or be null