User friendly URLs - mod rewrite and php redirections

Question

So far I\'ve done this:

RewriteBase /
RewriteCond  %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond  %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule  ^(.*)$ index.php?load=$1 [QSA,L]         


        

Answer 1

Here is simple example to begin with:

.htaccess

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^includes/.*$ index.php
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [QSA,L]

First, you must deny direct access to .php files, you can put them in separate folder like '/includes' and redirect any call to that folder to index.php. Second, allow direct access to files ( like images or javascripts ). Last rule, redirect anything else to index.php.

PHP

Basically you must have set of rules to test URL and some controller to handle the result.

define( 'WEB_ROOT', rtrim( dirname($_SERVER["SCRIPT_NAME"]), '/' ) );
define( 'INCLUDES_ROOT', 'includes/' );

// examples of rewrite rules ( $key = action, $value = regular expression )
$rules = array( 
    'pages' => "/(?'page'dashboard|about|signin|signup)",   // e.g. '/about'
    'gallery' => "/(?'username'[\w\-]+)/gallery",   // e.g. '/some-user/gallery'
    'album' => "/(?'username'[\w\-]+)/(?'album'[\w\-]+)",   // e.g. '/some-user/some-album'
    'picture' => "/(?'username'[\w\-]+)/(?'album'[\w\-]+)/(?'picture'[\w\-]+)",     // e.g. '/some-user/some-album/some-picture'
    'home' => "/"   // e.g. '/'
    );

// get uri
$uri = '/' . trim( str_replace( WEB_ROOT, '', $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] ), '/' );

// test uri
foreach ( $rules as $action => $rule ) {
    $pattern = '/^'.str_replace( '/', '\/', $rule ).'$/';

    if ( preg_match( $pattern, $uri, $params ) ) {
        /* now you know the action and parameters so you can 
         * include appropriate template file ( or proceed in some other way )
         * NOTE: variable $params vill be visible in template ( use print_r( $params ) to see result )
         */
        include( INCLUDES_ROOT . $action . '.php' );
        // exit to avoid the 404 message 
        exit();
    }
}

// nothing is found so handle 404 error
include( INCLUDES_ROOT . '404.php' );

The next step is to check the received parameters.