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Thread tagged as: Question, Problem, Addons

Help With Rewrite Rule

Currently I have category links in a sidebar for my blog to enable viewing only posts for that category.

The code for the link is

<a href="?cat=<perch:category id="catSlug" />"><perch:category id="catTitle" /></a>

Which displays as /news/?cat=my_blog_category, I would rather it showed as /news/my_blog_category

So I tried changing this in htaccess:

RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/?cat=$1 [L]

and the link to:

<a href="<perch:category id="catSlug" />"><perch:category id="catTitle" /></a>

But it does not work, anyone know how to do this? I know the rewrite is working as I have clean urls for the posts.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

  • 7 years ago
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago

my_blog_category contains underscores, but your regexp pattern doesn't include any.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

That was just a dummy category for example purposes!

So it might be /news/?cat=local-news
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago 
RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/?cat=$1 [L]

should match

/news/local-news
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

Thats what I had to start with above, but it does not load the page with any perch articles.

/news/?cat=local-news works but the rewrite does not, any idea why its not working?

This is my whole news rewrite rule:

RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/post.php?s=$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)/preview$ /news/post.php?s=$1&preview=all [L]
RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/?cat=$1 [L]

The post rules work okay.
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago

You have the same pattern for the posts.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

So should I change it to

RewriteRule ^news/category/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/?cat=$1

and the link to

<a href="/category/<perch:category id="catSlug" />"><perch:category id="catTitle" /></a>
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago

That would help.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

Tried it and if I delete these it works:

RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/post.php?s=$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)/preview$ /news/post.php?s=$1&preview=all [L]

But with these rules in it does not, any idea why?
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago

Yes! You've got two patterns that match the same thing. Only the first will ever match.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

But surely

RewriteRule ^news/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/post.php?s=$1 [L]

Is a different pattern from

RewriteRule ^news/category/([a-zA-Z0-9-/]+)$ /news/?cat=$1

If not what is the pattern?
Drew McLellan

Drew McLellan 2638 points
Perch Support

7 years ago

Yes, it is now. Put the most specific first. The former also matches the latter.

This really is beyond the scope of Perch support.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

Thanks!! The order solved it, putting the category one first made the difference.
Nigel Coath

Nigel Coath 1 points

7 years ago

PS I realise its beyond your support and I was not necessarily expecting your help, was hoping someone else might have the answer. I spent ages trawling mod_rewrite docs but it was just the order that stopped it.