Mod rewrite Tutorials

overview - syntax - basic - medium - advanced

Mod Rewrite Basic tutorials

The majority of you came to this site to find out how to do one of these basic tutorials. So lets go ahead and line up what we'll be learning.

• Simple Static to Dynamic Rewrites
• 301 and 302 redirects using mod rewrite
• File and file Extension rewrites

Tutorial 2
301 and 302 redirects using mod rewrite

Redirects are some of the easiest rewrites to do. They are very powerful so becareful. I'll just go over the most popular and then let anyone that wants to write a note about redirects post away after the tutorial.

Scenario 1:
We have changed the file name /blue-widgets.html to /awesome-blue-widgets.html. We need to set up a 301 permanent redirect so any user or search engine bot that visits the old file will be redirected to the new.

.htacess code RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase/

RewriteRule ^blue-widgets\.html$ awesome-blue-widgets.html [R=301,L]

In the pattern block we just match the file word for word. I escaped the . using a \ slash. You really don't have to do this but I think it's proper coding so I added it in there.

In the rewrite block you just declare the file you want to redirect to and finally you need to add the command flag R=301. Las we add the ,L to tell the mod that this is our last RewriteRule.

Note: [R] is a default 302. You must declare it as a [R=301] or you may page hijack your own file.

Practical uses for scenario 1

1. Redirecting users and search engines from old to the new file correctly.
   
2. Fixing a mispelled file that has already be cached by the search engines and redirecting it to the correct spelling of the file.

Scenario 2:
We've changed our domain name. We've set up every single file on the new domain. All the files will keep the same name, directory structure and extensions. We need to redirect users and search engine bots to our new domain via 301 so the new site starts getting picked up.

.htacces code on the old domain! RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.newdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Easier than you thought it would be. Pretty powerful stuff. Instead of having to set up a rewrite rule for each file we're going to capture all the file names and folder names with a wildcard match (.*). Then in the rewrite block we call it to the end of our domain name. Final touch is to add the [R=301,L] and you're done.

Practical uses for scenario 2

1. Redirecting users and search engines from old sites to the new file on a new site correctly.

But wait, there's more...

What if you have query strings on your urls? Easy enough mod rewrite will call the global server variable for the QUERY_STRING in the rewrite block. We'll go over that in the medium tutorials though since I don't want to get into the RewriteCond in the basics. If you want to skip there now be my guest. skip to medium mod rewrites >>

Scenario 3:
We have a file called /employment.html on this page we list all the jobs our company is taking resume's for. At this time though the page is empty and we want to redirect users to a temporary page called /no-vacancies.html.

302 means a temporary redirect. It implies that the page we are redirecting to is temporarly suppost to take the place of the file that you are redirected from.

.htaccess code RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /

RewriteRule ^employment\.html$ no-vacancies.html [R,L]

Note: Google will use the cache of no-vacancies.html in employment.html if you check it. It will also enherit any rankings, backlinks, titles etc that no-vacancies.html has. Be very careful with this. The last thing you want is to set up a 302 redirect to your index page and hijack the rankings of that page!

Practical uses for scenario 3

1. Redirecting users and search engines to temporary content files for pages that are being updated or not applicable at this current time.

<< mod rewrite syntax :: basic mod rewrites :: medium mod rewrites >>