.htaccess rewrite multi-level sub-directory exception

Question

I've been using an .htaccess script for clean URLS on my servers using my own custom CMS:

# this is the initialization
Options         +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine   On
RewriteBase     /
# these are the rewrite conditions
RewriteCond     %{REQUEST_FILENAME}     !-f
RewriteCond     %{REQUEST_FILENAME}     !-d
# and finally, the rewrite rules
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$   /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6 [L,QSA]
RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6&data6=$7 [L,QSA]

This works great at redirecting all requests to the pages.php script of my CMS.

The problem is that on rare occasion I have a client that wants to add a sub-directory in which they can add unlimited additional sub-directories all of which need to be redirected to index.html within them. For this discussion lets call this primary sub-directory main-dir which when a user goes to www.mysite.com/main-dir should re-direct them to www.mysite.com/main-dir/index.html

If the client adds more directories in main-dir the direction should be to an index.html within them E.g. www.mysite.com/main-dir/some-dir/index.html

So essentially I need to exempt main-dir and any of it's sub-directories from the regular pages.php redirect and make certain they all redirect to index.html within them.

I've tried a whole host of things to accomplish this including adding an .htaccess file in the sub-directory with only RewriteEngine off and adding various conditions and rules such as:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/collections/^

and

RewriteRule ^(collections)/$1 [L]

Nothing has worked.

currently if a web user goes to www.mysite.com/main-dir they are re-directed to the pages.php script and not exempted although if they go to www.mysite.com/main-dir/index.html they do get to the html page.

Any assistance would be appreciated.

Answer 1

You have to just make use of negative lookahead in every RewriteRule like this:

# ignore all rules if URI starts with /main-dir/
RewriteRule ^main-dir/  - [L,NC]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6 [L,QSA]

RewriteRule ^([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/([\w\s+-]+)/?$ pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6&data6=$7 [L,QSA]

That will make above rules applicable for everything except /main-dir/.

Also for serving index.html inside /main-dir/ you don't need to do anything since that is shown by default in Apache.

Answer 2

Just add the following to the top of the htaccess. This will prevent the url to be rewritten to pages.php is the first part of the url is an existing directory in the root. So example.com/xxx/whatever/ will not be rewritten if directory with name xxx exists.

RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/$1 -d
RewriteRule ^([^/]+)(/(.*))?$ - [L]

Your RewriteCond looked okay, but you had to repeat it in front of every RewriteRule. The same goes for the other two (... !-d and ... !-f). But I would suggest the way I use below, so you don't have to repeat them over and over again.

In the end your htaccess should look something like this:

# this is the initialization
Options         +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine   On
RewriteBase     /
# don't rewrite if any of these conditions 
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule .* - [L]

RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/$1 -d
RewriteRule ^([^/]+)(/(.*))?$ - [L]


# Rewrite all other matching urls to pages.php

#leave old rewrite rules (without the conditions) here, or use the much sorter version I would suggest.
RewriteRule     ^([^/]+)(?:/([^/]+))?(?:/([^/]+))?(?:/([^/]+))?(?:/([^/]+))?(?:/([^/]+))?(?:/([^/]+))?/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6&data6=$7 [L,QSA]

#old rules
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$   /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6 [L,QSA]
#RewriteRule     ^([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/([a-zA-Z0-9\-\_\ \+\-]+)/?$    /pages.php?which_page=$1&data1=$2&data2=$3&data3=$4&data4=$5&data5=$6&data6=$7 [L,QSA]