How to force the browser to reload cached CSS/JS files?

Question

I have noticed that some browsers (in particular, Firefox and Opera) are very zealous in using cached copies of .css and .js files, even be

Answer 1

Thanks at Kip for his perfect solution!

I extended it to use it as an Zend_view_Helper. Because my client run his page on a virtual host I also extended it for that.

Hope it helps someone else too.

/**
 * Extend filepath with timestamp to force browser to
 * automatically refresh them if they are updated
 *
 * This is based on Kip's version, but now
 * also works on virtual hosts
 * @link http://stackoverflow.com/questions/118884/what-is-an-elegant-way-to-force-browsers-to-reload-cached-css-js-files
 *
 * Usage:
 * - extend your .htaccess file with
 * # Route for My_View_Helper_AutoRefreshRewriter
 * # which extends files with there timestamp so if these
 * # are updated a automatic refresh should occur
 * # RewriteRule ^(.*)\.[^.][\d]+\.(css|js)$ $1.$2 [L]
 * - then use it in your view script like
 * $this->headLink()->appendStylesheet( $this->autoRefreshRewriter($this->cssPath . 'default.css'));
 *
 */
class My_View_Helper_AutoRefreshRewriter extends Zend_View_Helper_Abstract {

    public function autoRefreshRewriter($filePath) {

        if (strpos($filePath, '/') !== 0) {

            // path has no leading '/'
            return $filePath;
        } elseif (file_exists($_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . $filePath)) {

            // file exists under normal path
            // so build path based on this
            $mtime = filemtime($_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . $filePath);
            return preg_replace('{\\.([^./]+)$}', ".$mtime.\$1", $filePath);
        } else {

            // fetch directory of index.php file (file from all others are included)
            // and get only the directory
            $indexFilePath = dirname(current(get_included_files()));

            // check if file exist relativ to index file
            if (file_exists($indexFilePath . $filePath)) {

                // get timestamp based on this relativ path
                $mtime = filemtime($indexFilePath . $filePath);

                // write generated timestamp to path
                // but use old path not the relativ one
                return preg_replace('{\\.([^./]+)$}', ".$mtime.\$1", $filePath);
            } else {

                return $filePath;
            }
        }
    }

}

Cheers and thanks.