Question

In my .htaccess, I have the following

RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^users/?$   users.php
RewriteRule ^users/([a-z]+)/?$   users.php?username=$1

Everything works as intended if I do

http://example.com/users/
http://example.com/users/joeschmoe/

and PHP will read “joeschmoe” as the value for

 $_GET['username']

However, if I do

http://example.com/users/joeschmoe/?foo

PHP will not pick up

 $_GET['foo']

Any idea why this is happening and how I can get it work? Thanks for your time!

Answer 1

You are probably looking for the “QSA” option to RewriteRule :

‘qsappend|QSA‘ (query string append)

This flag forces the rewrite
engine to append a query string part
of the substitution string to the
existing string, instead of replacing
it. Use this when you want to add more
data to the query string via a rewrite
rule.

That page also states :

Modifying the Query String

By default, the query string is passed
through unchanged.
You can,
however, create URLs in the
substitution string containing a query
string part. Simply use a question
mark inside the substitution string to
indicate that the following text
should be re-injected into the query
string.
When you want to erase an
existing query string, end the
substitution string with just a
question mark.
To combine new
and old query strings, use the [QSA]
flag.

In your case, something like this should do :

RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^users/?$   users.php
RewriteRule ^users/([a-z]+)/?$   users.php?username=$1 [QSA]