$_GET & .htaccess | PHP ignorer values - php

Question

I got this problem, where I try to make an Image Archive. Most of it works, but I have now come to prettifying URLs. I have worked with this before, but somehow, it don't work now. If I add more then one Rewrite URL to the same file (index), it ignores the values added with it.
What I got:
Header add "disablevcache" "true"
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /folder/
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} !on
RewriteRule (.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI}
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2&id=$3 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?/([^/]+)$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2&id=$3 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
The following should allow me to access these URLs:
domain.com/archive/category
domain.com/archive/category/subcategory/
domain.com/archive/category/subcategory/id
domain.com/archive/category/subcategory/id/item
domain.com/archive will be made default, since I use an index.php file, in a folder. And item will just be for SEO and has nothing to do with PHP. (The last rewriteRule)
This works. I can access the same page, from all the different URLs. (archive/index.php). But when I try to use PHP to get the value from the provided URLs, it won't work. I can't even check and see if there are values.
No matter what I do, it just echo out Category & Sub Category on every URL. Also if I go to the default URL, domain.com/archive.
if($_GET['cat']){
echo 'Category';
if($_GET['sub']){
echo 'Sub Category';
}
}
Anyone who can see what I am doing wrong or got a suggestion to why it ignore my values? Or maybe know another way to do this, so I end up with the same result?

Answer 1

Apache rewrites in a loop. You need to stop it for archive/index.php since that always matches the first RewriteRule:
RewriteRule ^archive/index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2&id=$3 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
RewriteRule ^archive/([^/]+)/([^/]+)/([^/]+)?/([^/]+)$ archive/index.php?cat=$1&sub=$2&id=$3 [E=ORIG_URI:/$1]
You can also remove [E=ORIG_URI:/$1] if you don't use it.