I've spent the best part of this afternoon trying to figure out why my .htaccess file isn't working as expected. Basically what I wanted to do was add url rewrites to map old urls to new ones. So I created all my rewrites and pasted them into the .htaccess file, they worked in the sense that the pattern was matched and the server redirected, but it was always redirected to the directory path as in domain.com/var/www/docroot/.../tools.html I thought this might be as a result of RewriteBase being commented out and the root document not being set properly elsewhere, I don't have access to the main configuration files as this is a shared server. So I uncommented the RewriteBase / and the redirects worked as expected. The problem is when I try to navigate to the sitemap I get a 404 error, the sitemap is definitely there. Since then I have tried all sorts of things, I think I have narrowed the issue down to the
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-l
Whilst reading allsorts of stuff online and trying to understand the apache docs, I came accross something that said Rewrite Conditions only apply to the Rule immediately following it. So I tried adding the above Rewrite Conditions again jut before the index.php bootstrap section, doing this lets me get my sitemap, but when I try to load the home page I get a default Plesk control panel page, if I comment out the RewriteBase / my home page loads but the sitemap url tries to load domain.com/var/www/.../sitemap.xml. I'm confused and my head hurts now, I have been trying to find an answer all afternoon... I would appreciate any suggestions.
Here's the file:
############################################
## uncomment these lines for CGI mode
## make sure to specify the correct cgi php binary file name
## it might be /cgi-bin/php-cgi
# Action php5-cgi /cgi-bin/php5-cgi
# AddHandler php5-cgi .php
############################################
## GoDaddy specific options
# Options -MultiViews
## you might also need to add this line to php.ini
## cgi.fix_pathinfo = 1
## if it still doesn't work, rename php.ini to php5.ini
############################################
## this line is specific for 1and1 hosting
#AddType x-mapp-php5 .php
#AddHandler x-mapp-php5 .php
############################################
## default index file
DirectoryIndex index.html index.php
<IfModule mod_php5.c>
############################################
## adjust memory limit
# php_value memory_limit 64M
php_value memory_limit 256M
php_value max_execution_time 18000
############################################
## disable magic quotes for php request vars
php_flag magic_quotes_gpc off
############################################
## disable automatic session start
## before autoload was initialized
php_flag session.auto_start off
############################################
## enable resulting html compression
#php_flag zlib.output_compression on
###########################################
# disable user agent verification to not break multiple image upload
php_flag suhosin.session.cryptua off
###########################################
# turn off compatibility with PHP4 when dealing with objects
php_flag zend.ze1_compatibility_mode Off
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_security.c>
###########################################
# disable POST processing to not break multiple image upload
SecFilterEngine Off
SecFilterScanPOST Off
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
############################################
## enable apache served files compression
## http://developer.yahoo.com/performance/rules.html#gzip
# Insert filter on all content
###SetOutputFilter DEFLATE
# Insert filter on selected content types only
#AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/css text/javascript
# Netscape 4.x has some problems...
#BrowserMatch ^Mozilla/4 gzip-only-text/html
# Netscape 4.06-4.08 have some more problems
#BrowserMatch ^Mozilla/4\.0[678] no-gzip
# MSIE masquerades as Netscape, but it is fine
#BrowserMatch \bMSIE !no-gzip !gzip-only-text/html
# Don't compress images
#SetEnvIfNoCase Request_URI \.(?:gif|jpe?g|png)$ no-gzip dont-vary
# Make sure proxies don't deliver the wrong content
#Header append Vary User-Agent env=!dont-vary
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_ssl.c>
############################################
## make HTTPS env vars available for CGI mode
SSLOptions StdEnvVars
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
############################################
## enable rewrites
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
############################################
## you can put here your magento root folder
## path relative to web root
RewriteBase /
############################################
## workaround for HTTP authorization
## in CGI environment
RewriteRule .* - [E=HTTP_AUTHORIZATION:%{HTTP:Authorization}]
############################################
## always send 404 on missing files in these folders
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(media|skin|js)/
############################################
## never rewrite for existing files, directories and links
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-l
############################################
## old url rewrites
RewriteRule .*_57581_pd\.asp tools.html [R=302,L]
############################################
## rewrite everything else to index.php
##
RewriteRule .* index.php [L]
</IfModule>
############################################
## Prevent character encoding issues from server overrides
## If you still have problems, use the second line instead
AddDefaultCharset Off
#AddDefaultCharset UTF-8
<IfModule mod_expires.c>
############################################
## Add default Expires header
## http://developer.yahoo.com/performance/rules.html#expires
ExpiresDefault "access plus 1 year"
</IfModule>
############################################
## By default allow all access
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
###########################################
## Deny access to release notes to prevent disclosure of the installed Magento version
<Files RELEASE_NOTES.txt>
order allow,deny
deny from all
</Files>
############################################
## If running in cluster environment, uncomment this
## http://developer.yahoo.com/performance/rules.html#etags
#FileETag none
In the complete file there are lots of these types of rewrites RewriteRule .*_57581_pd\.asp tools.html [R=302,L], but there are too many to paste here so I have removed all but 1 for reference.