How to Rewrite URLs with mod_rewrite for Apache on Ubuntu 20.04

Apache’s mod_rewrite module lets you rewrite URLs more cleanly, translating human-readable paths into code-friendly query strings. It also enables you to rewrite URLs based on conditions. An .htaccess file lets you create and apply rewrite rules without accessing server configuration files. By placing the .htaccess file in the root of your web site, you can manage rewrites on a per-site or per-directory basis.

Introduction

Apache’s mod_rewrite module lets you rewrite URLs more cleanly, translating human-readable paths into code-friendly query strings. It also enables you to rewrite URLs based on conditions.

An .htaccess file lets you create and apply rewrite rules without accessing server configuration files. By placing the .htaccess file in the root of your web site, you can manage rewrites on a per-site or per-directory basis.

In this tutorial, you’ll enable mod_rewrite and use .htaccess files to create a basic URL redirection, and then explore a couple of advanced use cases.

Prerequisites

To follow this tutorial, you will need:

• One Ubuntu 20.04 server set up by following the Ubuntu 20.04 initial server setup guide, including a sudo non-root user and a firewall.
• Apache installed by following Step 1 of How To Install Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP (LAMP) stack on Ubuntu 20.04.

Step 1 — Enabling mod_rewrite

In order for Apache to understand rewrite rules, we first need to activate mod_rewrite. It’s already installed, but it’s disabled on a default Apache installation. Use the a2enmod command to enable the module:

sudo a2enmod rewrite

This will activate the module or alert you that the module is already enabled. To put these changes into effect, restart Apache.

sudo systemctl restart apache2

mod_rewrite is now fully enabled. In the next step, we will set up an .htaccess file that we’ll use to define rewrite rules for redirects.

Step 2 — Setting Up .htaccess

An .htaccess file allows us to modify our rewrite rules without accessing server configuration files. For this reason, .htaccess is critical to your web application’s security. The period that precedes the filename ensures that the file is hidden.

apache urls ubuntu 20.04

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