Comments on: Enable .htaccess in Apache on Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)

By: Sambodhi Prem

Sambodhi Prem — Tue, 28 Sep 2010 23:13:01 +0000

I used a free tool called “Tinker Tool” which allows me to change the visibility of files starting with a dot on the Mac.

By: Musta

Musta — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 11:13:40 +0000

Hi Vlad, finally it worked!
It was just another silly mistake of mine. I just had to get ride of the .txt extention. That was all and thanks again for your time

By: Vlad

Vlad — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 20:18:58 +0000

I think it would be better to continue this conversation over email. Please provide a working email address and we will communicate further there. The one you are currently posting for the comments does not appear to be valid.

By: Musta

Musta — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 17:49:28 +0000

Hi Vld, it is me again I tried again with a fresh reinstall of MAMP. This time I didn’t get any error in my browser i get redirected to my navigation pages correctly but the urls rewrite just do not work. Instead of getting SEO friendly urls I only get the generated urls (like: http://localhost:8888/mysite/index.html?ProductId=232) with its variables in the navigator address bar. It is really weird, the newly created .htaccess files generate no errors but it just do no work. In my apache log file I get the following which I do not really know if it has to do with my problem.

[Tue Jun 01 19:23:29 2010] [notice] caught SIGTERM, shutting down
[Tue Jun 01 19:23:30 2010] [notice] Digest: generating secret for digest authentication …
[Tue Jun 01 19:23:30 2010] [notice] Digest: done
[Tue Jun 01 19:23:30 2010] [notice] Apache/2.0.63 (Unix) PHP/5.3.2 DAV/2 configured — resuming normal operations

I am really disappointed with this since I could not keep on programming my application without enabling the Urls rewrite mod through .htaccess. And I am deeply sorry for losing your time.

By: Vlad

Vlad — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 14:13:40 +0000

I am not sure what the problem is with your configuration as I have downloaded the latest copy of MAMP, installed it, created the .htaccess file with the content you provided and it works seemingly!

Do you receive any error in your browser? What page are you redirected to and what message do you receive when you access a webpage like: http://localhost:8888/mysite/index.html?ProductId=232

By: Musta

Musta — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 11:31:56 +0000

Hi Vlad, thanks for your quick reply. I have just followed your advice and at least I do not get the server internal error of apache. however I could not get the urls rewrite function through the following .htaccess file:

# Enable mod_rewrite
RewriteEngine On

# Specify the folder in which the application resides.
# Use / if the application is in the root.
RewriteBase /mysite

# Redirect URLs ending in /index.php or /index.html to /
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ .*/index\.(php|html?)\ HTTP
RewriteRule ^(.*)index\.(php|html?)$ $1 [R=301,L]

# Redirect category pages
RewriteRule ^.*-d([0-9]+)/.*-c([0-9]+)/page-([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?DepartmentId=$1&CategoryId=$2&Page=$3 [L]
RewriteRule ^.*-d([0-9]+)/.*-c([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?DepartmentId=$1&CategoryId=$2 [L]

# Redirect department pages
RewriteRule ^.*-d([0-9]+)/page-([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?DepartmentId=$1&Page=$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^.*-d([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?DepartmentId=$1 [L]

# Redirect subpages of the home page
RewriteRule ^page-([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?Page=$1 [L]

# Redirect product details pages
RewriteRule ^.*-p([0-9]+)/?$ index.php?ProductId=$1 [L]

instead When I checked the apache log file I get the following error.

authentication …
[Tue Jun 01 12:57:55 2010] [notice] Digest: done
[Tue Jun 01 12:57:55 2010] [notice] Apache/2.0.63 (Unix) PHP/5.3.2 DAV/2 configured — resuming normal operations
[Tue Jun 01 12:59:29 2010] [error] [client ::1] client denied by server configuration: /Applications/MAMP/htdocs/mysite/.htaccess

I would be so happy if you could tell me what I am doing wrong here. Thanks a lot Vald

By: Vlad

Vlad — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 09:02:52 +0000

The answer to your problem is very simple: I presume you are trying to edit the .htaccess files with the built-in text editor on Mac, that's TextEdit. Unfortunately for this simple operation, the default setting in TextEdit is to create new documents in RTF format, instead of plain text. So what I suggest is that you delete the previously created .htaccess files, open TextEdit, switch to plain text from Format menu > Make Plain Text or Cmd+Shift+T, add your content and save the .htaccess file. You can also set this as default setting for TextEdit using Preferences > New Document > select Plain Text.