Question

i’m new to mod_rewrite, and i’m trying to convert my web address from:

website.com/profile.php?user=andy

to the following:

website.com/user/andy

This is my following code:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^user/([A-Za-z0-9]+)/?$ profile.php?user=$1 [NC,L]

I researched extensively and this does seem to be the correct way to do it, but it doesn’t redirect to where i want it to, it just redirects to this:

http://website.com/profile.php?user=andy

which means i must doing something wrong…

Can anyone help me out here? I would appreciate any tips.

Answer 1

If you want

• http://website.com/profile.php?user=andy ->301-> http://website.com/user/andy
• http://website.com/user/andy means http://website.com/profile.php?user=andy

They are 2 different things, you’ll need 2 rules:

RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^user=([A-Za-z0-9]+)
RewriteRule ^profile.php /user/%1? [R=301,L]

RewriteRule ^user/([A-Za-z0-9]+)/?$ profile.php?a=b&user=$1 [L]

The first will 301 (moved permanently) redirect to the pretty url.
The second will allow your application to understand the pretty url.

Whenever you change the url scheme for a site you should take care of existing links. As such, that first rule is required/a good idea. You should not, however, need the first rule when using your own application. If your own application is generating links to profile.php?user=me – change your application code.