PHP: URL format www.mysite.com/users/33 - php

Question

I've seen URL's like this around and I'm just wondering how it is they are used.
Until now I've been using www.mysite.com/users/?id=33
How can I use the other format?

Answer 1

Paul Peelan's answer is correct if a little verbose :-) Put this in your .htaccess file in the root of your site:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^users/(\d+)$ /users/?id=$1
This will match /users/33, /users/1, /users/12345 etc and redirect to /users/?id=12345.
This requires that your Apache configuration has the mod_rewrite engine enabled. See the mod_rewrite docs for further information.

Answer 2

You will have to use the "mod-rewrite" and e.g. an .htaccess file.
Apache will then send the urls according to your settings in the .htaccess file.
E.g.:
Various rewrite rules.
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on
# If your site can be accessed both with and without the 'www.' prefix, you
# can use one of the following settings to redirect users to your preferred
# URL, either WITH or WITHOUT the 'www.' prefix. Choose ONLY one option:
#
# To redirect all users to access the site WITH the 'www.' prefix,
# (http://example.com/... will be redirected to http://www.example.com/...)
# adapt and uncomment the following:
# RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example\.com$ [NC]
# RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [L,R=301]
#
# To redirect all users to access the site WITHOUT the 'www.' prefix,
# (http://www.example.com/... will be redirected to http://example.com/...)
# uncomment and adapt the following:
# RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.example\.com$ [NC]
# RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://example.com/$1 [L,R=301]
# Modify the RewriteBase if you are using Drupal in a subdirectory or in a
# VirtualDocumentRoot and the rewrite rules are not working properly.
# For example if your site is at http://example.com/drupal uncomment and
# modify the following line:
# RewriteBase /drupal
#
# If your site is running in a VirtualDocumentRoot at http://example.com/,
# uncomment the following line:
# RewriteBase /
# Rewrite URLs of the form 'index.php?q=x'.
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?q=$1 [L,QSA]
</IfModule>
Regards,
Paul

Answer 3

I know you have already selected an answer for this question, but this is quite useful to know. The PHP framework Codeigniter allows you to use URLs like this by default. I found it a lot easier to do URL rewriting this way. Further information about this, including code samples, can be found at http://codeigniter.com/user_guide/general/urls.html