mod_rewrite with URLs as parameters (newbie)

I have set up very simple mod_rewrite rules as follows on Apache 1.3.34
running w/ PHP 5.1.2. This is in the .htaccess file:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*) index.php

So, from my script's perspective, the entire request comes in as a single
string which my application parses out. This works fine for most
situations like this:

http://www.mysite.com/root/parameter...er2/parameter3 etc...

My script would get: "/root/parameter1/parameter2/parameter3"

The problem occurs when I want parameter2 to be a url, say
http://www.cnn.com

Even when encoded, apache either does not pass this properly or gives me a
404 error.

I realize this is a very basic rewrite configuration. The link would look
something like:

http://www.mysite.com/something/jump...w.yoursite.com

The same applies when I would pass a search string (or any string) as part
of the URL which may contain characters that cause problems.

What am I doing wrong? Thanks in advance.

jober2 wrote:
> I have set up very simple mod_rewrite rules as follows on Apache 1.3.34
[...]
> http://www.mysite.com/something/jump...w.yoursite.com

You have an encoded slash (%2F) here, which is not allowed. The request
will end up in a 404 immediately, before mod_rewrite is reached.

Encoded slashes can be allowed with the AllowEncodedSlashes-direktive in
httpd.conf from apache > 2.0.46. See
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod...encodedslashes

You might try to double-encode your string % --> %25 like
/something/jumpto/http%253A%252F%252Fwww.yoursite.com which should work.

Anyway, I would avoid such characters in an URL, if possible.

--
Robert

Robert Ionescu <robsiegen@googlemail.com> wrote in
news:ds8fr0$kfr$1@online.de:

> Encoded slashes can be allowed with the AllowEncodedSlashes-direktive
> in httpd.conf from apache > 2.0.46. See
> http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod...encodedslashes
>
> You might try to double-encode your string % --> %25 like
> /something/jumpto/http%253A%252F%252Fwww.yoursite.com which should
> work.
>
> Anyway, I would avoid such characters in an URL, if possible.
>

Excellent, thank you for the clear response. I will continue to append
these "slash-prone" arguments in the traditional way using '?' or via
post.

This method seems to coexist nicely with apache/php. Thanks for the
quick reply.

Rob