Question

I am trying to set up a dynamic application-serving framework for a development test.

My desired outcome is that when a user goes to a URL, if it is formatted like hostname.com/somecategory/someapplicationname/ or hostname.com/somecategory/someapplicationname (without the slash at the end), it should serve the user the requested application from the database, as long as the category and application name exists as a key.

I have a special case where some applications are not in the database, and they exist on file with that same URL, so we serve the existing file with priority over any database records.

The case with dynamic content from the database works fine. The case for the existing file works 100% only if there is a slash at the end. If the slash is not there, it will serve the right file, BUT the URL looks rather odd. It’ll show: hostname.com/somecategory/someapplicationname/?category=somecategory&appname=someapplicationname
So, it works, but the unexpected output makes me feel that the solution is not complete.

I am using apache mod_rewrite, and my .htaccess file is as follows:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^([A-Za-z0-9-]+)/([A-Za-z0-9-]+)/?$ route.php?category=$1&appname=$2 [NC,L] 

The PHP code specific to this case is as follows. I stripped the validation and database connection from this snippet for simplicity of reading, but the logic for this particular case is preserved.

$file = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . $_GET['category'] . "/" . $_GET['appname'] . "/index.php";
$fileNoPHP = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . $_GET['category'] . "/" . $_GET['appname'] . "/index.html";
$_fileExists = file_exists($file);
$_fileNoPHPExists = file_exists($fileNoPHP);
include_once($_fileExists ? $file : $fileNoPHP);

To be clear, my question is: Why is my existing file case appending the GET parameters to the end of the URL, ONLY when the slash at the end is not there?

Thanks for your time. If you need further information, please let me know and I will provide.

Answer 1

The rule that you have is not what is causing the odd looking URL:

RewriteRule ^([A-Za-z0-9-]+)/([A-Za-z0-9-]+)/?$ route.php?category=$1&appname=$2 [NC,L] 

This should be fine. Somewhere you are either generating that link or redirecting the browser to that link. If you have a rule that looks something like this:

RewriteRule route.php /%1/%2/ [R=301,L]

You need to remove the query string by adding a ? at the end:

RewriteRule route.php /%1/%2/? [R=301,L]

Or if you’re using Apache 2.4, include a QSD flag in the brackets.

If that doesn’t solve it, you need to add a rule to ensure a trailing slash gets appended, although it may be an issue with DirectorySlash redirecting for you (which you can turn off).