Regex Character Definitions for htaccess
- June 24, 2011
- 0 Comment
- Guides
- Posted by Gee
#- the
# instructs the server to ignore the line. used for including comments. each line of comments requires it’s own #. when including comments, it is good practice to use only letters, numbers, dashes, and underscores. this practice will help eliminate/avoid potential server parsing errors.
[F]- Forbidden: instructs the server to return a
403 Forbidden to the client.
[L]- Last rule: instructs the server to stop rewriting after the preceding directive is processed.
[N]- Next: instructs Apache to rerun the rewrite rule until all rewriting directives have been achieved.
[G]- Gone: instructs the server to deliver
Gone (no longer exists) status message.
[P]- Proxy: instructs server to handle requests by
mod_proxy
[C]- Chain: instructs server to chain the current rule with the previous rule.
[R]- Redirect: instructs Apache to issue a redirect, causing the browser to request the rewritten/modified URL.
[NC]- No Case: defines any associated argument as case-insensitive. i.e., “NC” = “No Case”.
[PT]- Pass Through: instructs
mod_rewrite to pass the rewritten URL back to Apache for further processing.
[OR]- Or: specifies a logical “or” that ties two expressions together such that either one proving true will cause the associated rule to be applied.
[NE]- No Escape: instructs the server to parse output without escaping characters.
[NS]- No Subrequest: instructs the server to skip the directive if internal sub-request.
[QSA]- Append Query String: directs server to add the query string to the end of the expression (URL).
[S=x]- Skip: instructs the server to skip the next “x” number of rules if a match is detected.
[E=variable:value]- Environmental Variable: instructs the server to set the environmental variable “variable” to “value”.
[T=MIME-type]- Mime Type: declares the mime type of the target resource.
[]- specifies a character class, in which any character within the brackets will be a match. e.g., [xyz] will match either an x, y, or z.
[]+- character class in which any combination of items within the brackets will be a match. e.g., [xyz]+ will match any number of x’s, y’s, z’s, or any combination of these characters.
[^]- specifies not within a character class. e.g., [^xyz] will match any character that is neither x, y, nor z.
[a-z]- a dash (-) between two characters within a character class ([]) denotes the range of characters between them. e.g., [a-zA-Z] matches all lowercase and uppercase letters from a to z.
a{n}- specifies an exact number,
n, of the preceding character. e.g., x{3} matches exactly three x’s.
a{n,}- specifies
n or more of the preceding character. e.g., x{3,} matches three or more x’s.
a{n,m}- specifies a range of numbers, between
n and m, of the preceding character. e.g., x{3,7} matches three, four, five, six, or seven x’s.
()- used to group characters together, thereby considering them as a single unit. e.g., (perishable)?press will match press, with or without the perishable prefix.
^- denotes the beginning of a regex (regex = regular expression) test string. i.e., begin argument with the proceeding character.
$- denotes the end of a regex (regex = regular expression) test string. i.e., end argument with the previous character.
?- declares as optional the preceding character. e.g.,
monzas? will match monza or monzas, while mon(za)? will match either mon or monza. i.e., x? matches zero or one of x.
!- declares negation. e.g., “
!string” matches everything except “string”.
.- a dot (or period) indicates any single arbitrary character.
-- instructs “not to” rewrite the URL, as in “
...domain.com.* - [F]”.
+- matches one or more of the preceding character. e.g.,
G+ matches one or more G’s, while “+” will match one or more characters of any kind.
*- matches zero or more of the preceding character. e.g., use “
.*” as a wildcard.
|- declares a logical “or” operator. for example,
(x|y) matches x or y.
\- escapes special characters (
^ $ ! . * | ). e.g., use “\.” to indicate/escape a literal dot.
\.- indicates a literal dot (escaped).
/*- zero or more slashes.
.*- zero or more arbitrary characters.
^$- defines an empty string.
^.*$- the standard pattern for matching everything.
[^/.]- defines one character that is neither a slash nor a dot.
[^/.]+- defines any number of characters which contains neither slash nor dot.
http://- this is a literal statement — in this case, the literal character string, “http://”.
^domain.*- defines a string that begins with the term “
domain”, which then may be proceeded by any number of any characters.
^domain\.com$- defines the exact string “
domain.com”.
-d- tests if string is an existing directory
-f- tests if string is an existing file
-s- tests if file in test string has a non-zero value
