My first stab at mod_rewrite - need practical advice

First off this is doing the job that I want it to. Namely, user enters:

--) mydomain.com/stuff/cat/tech/linux

and it becomes the equivalent of

--) mydomain.com/stuff/news.php?cat=tech&sub_cat=linux

My .htaccess is located in the sub-directory "stuff"

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
 RewriteEngine on
 RewriteRule cat/(.*)/(.*)$ news.php?cat=$1&sub_cat=$2
</IfModule>

Code (markup):

Tested, works, can't find a problem. However being the paranoid programmer type...

cat/(.*)/(.*)$

Finally the question:
Since I am not starting with a ^, are there considerations and/or unintended consequences with this? I guess that the exp will match any string ending with "cat/anything/anything" and how could it start with anything except "mydomain.com/stuff/" since the .htaccess is located there? Is there some best practice I am missing?

There isn't enough coffee in my bloodstream, so I hope this made sense.

TIA

 

have alook here

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=23044

(.*) allows all characters, as you want to tighten control you may wish to use
([0-9]+) at least one character but numbers only or ([A-Z]+) capital characters only and so on...

Expat

 

Thanks for the link and info. I tried numerous variations, but ended up almost back where I started from. I kept getting 500's when I tried [NC] and a-z rather than a-zA-Z, but no big deal.

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
 RewriteEngine on
 RewriteRule ^cat/([a-zA-Z]+)/([a-zA-Z]*)$ news.php?cat=$1&sub_cat=$2 [L]
</IfModule>

Code (markup):

It is more exacting, so I am happier. I also see now how I can extend it to do some other things!

 

cheers there is an exaustive one on WMW as well

http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum92/4332.htm

So if you want to indulge in mod_rewrite have fun

Expat