Getting Internal server error for RewriteRule -.htaccesss

Question

I am trying to write the RewriteRule for the following scenario

When I hit the url: localhost/ example

it needs to load the example.php file which is in sub folder( pages )

Folder structure:

- pages

             - example.php

     - styles

     - scripts

     - index.php

my .htaccess file is as follows

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ pages/$1.php

but I am getting

500 Internal server error

Anyone please help me with this scenario.

Answer 1

Your rewrite rules are probably looping. Add a condition to prevent this from happening:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/pages/$1.php -f
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /pages/$1.php [L]

Since the rewrite engine loops until the URI stops changing, the (.*) matches everything, including /pages/whatever . So the URI keeps getting /pages/ appended to the front of the URI.