Question

I have next rewrite rules:

RewriteEngine ON

RewriteBase /

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^([a-z]+)/(js|css|img)/(.+\.jpg|gif|png|js|css)$ media/myfiles/$1/$2/$3 [L]
RewriteRule .* index.php

I my application i have route class, that can process url’s for my needs.

When i try to open file, that contains extension that will match to rewrite rule, i move to next rewrite rule, and my router class process this url…

Any ideas why apache doesn’t stop after rule match first time?

P.S. first rule works after disabling second rule.

Answer 1

Take a look here: http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/rewrite/flags.html

If you are using RewriteRule in either .htaccess files or in
sections, it is important to have some understanding of
how the rules are processed. The simplified form of this is that once
the rules have been processed, the rewritten request is handed back to
the URL parsing engine to do what it may with it. It is possible that
as the rewritten request is handled, the .htaccess file or
section may be encountered again, and thus the ruleset may be run
again from the start. Most commonly this will happen if one of the
rules causes a redirect – either internal or external – causing the
request process to start over.

(emph mine)

So what I think happens is that your last rule hits, and redirects. It doesn’t call the bottom line. But then, the request is handled like any other request, your regexp DOESN”T hit, and in this run the bottom line DOES come into play.

This is also why it works when you disable the bottom rule: the second time around there is nothing to do, so nothing happens.