.htaccess help

Correct me if i am wrong but i am under the allusion that using the .htaccess file it would be possible for me to redirect all my previous thread URLs to a new setup which i have recently implemented?

Basically my old URL format was like so:
http://www.myforums.com/forum-name/t...itle-4541.html

But i have decided to make them a little more content friendly, like so:
http://www.myforums.com/forum-name/v...tle-t4541.html

Now could anyone provide me with an appropriate .htaccess redirect rule which would ensure that anyone visiting the URL in the format as described above, would be 301 redirected to the threads new location? Since currently only "Page Not Found" errors are being displayed when users try and access indexed pages from search engines and threads posted from forums alike.

:(

Michael,

do you mean that "vbulletin" word is added before the thread title and "t" character before thread id?

If so, try the following rewrite rules:

RewriteRule ^([^/]+)/([^/]+)-(\d+)\.html$ $1/vbulletin-$2-t$3.html

Yes, the following have been added.
I'll give this is a try now.

This doesnt appear to have made any difference. From viewing what Google has indexed of my site here, and trying out some of the thread URLs it has stored i am still receiving the same error, "Page Not Found".

Example:
http://www.staff-lounge.com/entertai.../trapt-40.html

And yet the below URL which adds "vbulletin-" and "t" works still:
http://www.staff-lounge.com/entertai...trapt-t40.html

Did you added new RewriteRule at the top of others, right after "RewriteEngine on" line? (it is required)

Here is my current .htaccess file:

... nothing to see ...

Please add [L,R=301] to the new rewriterule line.

Do you mean like so;

RewriteRule ^([^/]+)/([^/]+)-(\d+)\.html$ $1/vbulletin-$2-t$3.html [L,R=301]

I have tried implementing the following suggestion but just receive "Page Not Found" message error once again.

Hm.. it works for me.

Try to replace
[^/] with . (dot)
and
\d with [0-9]

Thank you the last change made all the difference and now works appropriately. What exactly did this last change do?

It changes the "character class" in regular expression, because more advanced regexp modifiers are not supported by some mod_rewrite versions.

You can try to revert one of the replacements mentioned to find out exactly which one of them is not supported.

Originally Posted by Oleg Ignatiuk

It changes the "character class" in regular expression, because more advanced regexp modifiers are not supported by some mod_rewrite versions.

You can try to revert one of the replacements mentioned to find out exactly which one of them is not supported.

How can you find out which mod_rewrite version a server is running?
How can you upgrade to a later version which could support these more "advanced regexp modifiers"?

It depends on the Apache version you are running.
I can't say exactly now which versions support different character classes in regexps, but this is something I noticed.

Originally Posted by Oleg Ignatiuk

It depends on the Apache version you are running.
I can't say exactly now which versions support different character classes in regexps, but this is something I noticed.

I am currently running Apache 1.3.34, and PHP 4.4.0

It currently appears as though there is a conflict with the .htaccess code added. Firstly, in my site Archive, and in my vB Easy Archive their URLs are as followed:

vBulletin Archive: /sitemap/f-3.html
And is being rewritten to: http://www.staff-lounge.com/feedback...policy-t3.html

vB Easy Archive: /vbulletin/forum/3-1.html
And is being rewritten to: http://www.staff-lounge.com/site-ann...-rules-t1.html

Now then could it be possible for in the .htaccess file to specify for this rule added from this thread not to apply for the /vbulletin/ and /sitemap/ folders. Or is there any other way to fix this issue?