Rewrite rules for php urls - php

Question

I've tried to find an answer for a question i had in my mind, but it seems to I can't find it.
How is it possible to make some php urls with "?" and "=" to /
Example one (1):
example.com/user.php?profile=example
to:
example.com/user/profile/example
Example two (2):
example.com/forum.php?thread=example-in-an-example
to:
example.com/forum/thread/example-in-an-example
Like a code that takes the second "/" (slash) as a "?" and the third and the rest as a "=" so i can freely use it instead of making a new one for each page...
LIKE: /forum (or any others) is like the page itself
AND: /thread (or any others) is like the $_GET
AND: /example-in-an-example (or any others) is like the value to the $_GET
EXTRA:
here is a code from Jeroen:
RewriteRule ^(.*)/(.*)/(.*)/$ $1.php?$2=$3 [L]
Problem one (1): when going to like: "example.com/forum" or "example.com/user" its giving a 404 error
Problem two (2): When using links like "example.com/forum/thread/test-thread/reply/2" it gives 404 error, (supose to loop with "&" and "=" after making the 1st real one so its enable to use more than one $_GET)

Answer 1

Add this to your .htaccess file:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^user/profile/(.*)/$ user.php?profile=$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^forum/thread/(.*)/$ /forum.php?thread=$1 [L]
Or a more generic version...
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)/(.*)/(.*)/$ $1.php?$2=$3 [L]
Make sure Apache's mod rewrite is enabled!

Answer 2

If you have full access to the application and you can modify the code, I can submit you some trick I usually use for my REST utilities.
Put AllowOverride All inside your apache configuration to enable .htaccess file.
Assure to LoadModule your mod_rewrite module too.
Create a .htaccess file into your web server document root (your application path) and put this stuff inside:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . index.php [L]
Create a file called index.php and put this inside, this will be your controller:
<?
// echo "REQUEST_URI: " . $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] . "</br>\n";
$controller = explode("/", $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']);
//print_r($controller);
$resource = $controller[1];
$operation = $controller[2];
$operation_value = $controller[3];
echo "Requested resource: $resource, opetation: $operation, value: $operation_value<br>\n";
switch($resource) {
case 'user':
echo "User requested\n";
//require_once("user.php");
break;
case 'forum':
echo "Forum requested\n";
//require_once("forum.php");
break;
/* add any other resource */
default:
echo "Requested page was not found.\n";
break;
}
?>
When the user call http://example.com/user/profile/ZeroXitreo the page will be renderer as:
Requested resource: user, opetation: profile, value: ZeroXitreo
User requested
When the user call http://example.com/forum/thread/example-in-an-example the page will be:
Requested resource: forum, opetation: thread, value: example-in-an-example
Forum requested
Read the PHP code of the controller, I think it's quite self explaining.