Retrieving GET[] information, from URL forwarding using htaccess - php

Question

I have an index.php and news.php and .htaccess files in my localhost/DIRECTORY/AID/
folder, and I am basically trying send/receive data from index.php to news.php
This is a function inside the index.php, which creates a link from database query, and echos out a title of an article.
function news_preview() {
$query = "SELECT * FROM updates ORDER BY update_id DESC LIMIT 5 ";
$result = mysql_query($query) or die(mysql_error());
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
$url = "/news/$row[update_id]/" . preg_replace('/[^a-zA-Z0-9-_]/', '_',
$row['update_title']);
echo " " . substr($row['update_title'], 0, 26) . "...<br/>";
}
}
echo news_preview();
Now, here is what the .htaccess looks like
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-l
RewriteRule ^news/([0-9]+)/([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)$ DIRECTORY/AID/news.php?id=$1 [QSA,L]
Now, to the problem. Basically, when I clicked on the link (generated by news_preview() )
shown in the index.php, All I get in the news.php page is nothing. But, probably because I am trying to use the $_GET['title'] Although, I am not certain if that is how we retrieve data. But, the links take me to http://localhost/news/46/This_is_news_title
which is perfect, but I am getting the Object Not Found error
Below, is the image of the error I am getting.

Answer 1

Put this code in the htdocs/.htaccess:
Options +FollowSymLinks -MultiViews
# Turn mod_rewrite on
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^news/([0-9]+)/.*$ /DIRECTORY/AID/news.php?id=$1 [QSA,L,NC]

Answer 2

In the AID/ folder along with index.php & news.php The problem, is I don't know how to get the data from the url in the news.php
The htaccess file needs to be in your document root. When the request URI is in the form:
/news/1234/something-something
The order apache uses to resolve whether overrides (i.e. stuff in htaccess files) should be applied is first see if this is a directory /news/1234/something-something and if so, if there's an htaccess file in it. That's not a directory so apache moves on. If /news/1234 is a directory, and if so, see if there's an htaccess file in it; since it's not, nothing happens. Then apache checks if /news is a directory and if so, check for htaccess; it's also not a directory so nothing happens. Finally, apache checks the document root / to see if there's an htaccess. Since the document root is a directory, that's where you need to put your rules.
The /DIRECTORY/AID/ directory is never in the mix here, unless that is actually where your document root is. If DIRECTORY/AID/ is your document root, e.g. the URI / maps directly to that directory, then you need to change your rules to:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-l
RewriteRule ^news/([0-9]+)/([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)$ news.php?id=$1 [QSA,L]

Answer 3

Sounds like you're expecting to be able to read the last portion of the URL as $_GET['title'], but your htaccess rule isn't adding it to the query string.
Try changing
RewriteRule ^news/([0-9]+)/([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)$ DIRECTORY/AID/news.php?id=$1 [QSA,L]
to
RewriteRule ^news/([0-9]+)/([A-Za-z0-9_-]+)$ DIRECTORY/AID/news.php?id=$1&title=$2 [QSA,L]