Rewrite rule catch all + QSA not working - php

Question

I'm trying to show a default view (home) when the user lands in the root of my site, this is what I use
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/$
Rewriterule ^(.*)$ index.php?view=home [L]
With this other rule, I'm trying to catch everything that has variables (since all my paths are rewritten, I should never have something like mydomain.com?somevar=true, so i look for & or = or ?), and pass the query string to a page
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^([\&|\=|\?]+)$
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ badstuff.php [L,QSA]
What I don't understand is that mydomain.com/?test=true is redirected to index.php?view=home instead of going to badstuff.php
What am i doing wrong? If I comment the 1st cond + rule, the second rule is never matched...
Thanks you.
Edit: Added more rules for better understanding. Forgot to mention, Apache 2.4
This is what I have now
#standard views
Rewriterule ^home$ index.php?view=home [L] (works)
Rewriterule ^about$ index.php?view=about [L] (works)
#default view
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/$
Rewriterule ^(.*)$ index.php?view=home [L] (works)
#bad stuff
Rewriterule ^[\?=&]$ badstuff.php [L,QSA] (doesnt work)

Answer 1

Your chief issue here is that you are attempting to match a query string inside REQUEST_URI, but that variable does not contain the query string.
From the Apache docs:
REQUEST_URI
The path component of the requested URI, such as "/index.html". This notably excludes the query string which is available as its own variable named QUERY_STRING.
So instead, you just need to match any non-empty character inside %{QUERY_STRING}, and you must place that rule before the rule matching / because /?abc=123 would still match the / rule.
# Match a non-empty query string (. is any one character)
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} .
# Don't apply this if the view= has already been applied
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} !view=
# Rewrite to badstuff.php and append the params.
RewriteRule ^.*$ badstuff.php [L,QSA]
# Then rewrite the root
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/$
Rewriterule ^(.*)$ index.php?view=home [L]
Better version:
I would simplify your first rule a bit to eliminate the RewriteCond since only the path needs to be matched by RewriteRule. I've also removed all the () capture groups because you are not actually using the values they capture.
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} .
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} !view=
# Rewrite to badstuff.php and append the params.
RewriteRule .* badstuff.php [L,QSA]
# Match a non-empty path into view=
RewriteRule ^([^/]+)$ index.php?view=$1 [L]
# Then a simpler rule that matches ^$ (no path)
RewriteRule ^$ index.php?view=home [L]
If you applied this in a VirtualHost config instead of .htaccess, the RewriteRule would include the leading /, so you'd need to use instead:
RewriteRule ^/$ index.php?view=home [L]
But / is not used in .htaccess.
Now, if the !view= is too broadly preventing the query string from matching, you may resort to matching in THE_REQUEST for query params.
# Match any query string in the raw request
RewriteCond THE_REQUEST \?[^=]+
RewriteRule .* badstuff.php [L,QSA]
#... Then the other rules