The Apache module mod_rewrite is very much en vogue in this web2.0-obsessed world we live in. It’s a powerful tool for URL manipulation, and has many applications that are of interest to the LAMP developer.
I’m currently building a web app that requires wildcard subdomains. So, if the domain name is test.com, the following would all point to the homepage:
http://www.test.com
http://this.is.a.test.com
http://this.is.even.more.testing.at.test.com
The following mod_rewrite recipe achieves this:
ServerAlias *.yourdomain.com
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} .*.yourdomain.com [NC]
Substitute yourdomain.com with the domain you’re using.
You can also redirect request to folders:
http://blog.test.com – points to http://test.com/blog
To do this, add the following line to the above example:
RewriteRule ^/(.*)$ /var/www/html/%{HHTP_HOST}/$1 [L]
Change the /var/www/html path to match your system configuration.
For this to work, you’ll need a wildcard DNS record for the domain (easy to setup if you control your own DNS).
If you’d like to find out more about mod_rewrite, check out:
mod_rewrite: A Beginner’s Guide to URL Rewriting
