Kohana3: Different .htaccess rewritebase and kohana base_url for dev and production environment

Question

In my bootstrap.php I have the following:

if($_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] == 'localhost')
    Kohana::$environment = 'development';
else
    Kohana::$environment = 'production';

...

switch(Kohana::$environment)
{
    case 'development':
        $settings = array('base_url' => '/kohana/', 'index_file' => FALSE);
        break;

    default:
        $settings = array('base_url' => '/', 'index_file' => FALSE);
        break;
}

In .htaccesshave this:

# Installation directory
RewriteBase /kohana/

This means that if I just upload my kohana application, it will break because the RewriteBase in the .htaccess file will be wrong. Is there a way I can have a conditional in the .htaccess file similar to the one I have in the bootstrap so that it will use the correct RewriteBase?

Blockbuster

Answer 1

I don't think there is a way to have a conditional RewriteBase. The only way in Apache that comes to mind is putting the RewriteBase directive into a <Location> tag but that is only available in httpd.conf itself, not in .htaccess files.

What I usually do in such cases is define a different AccessFileName in the local environment, for example htaccess.txt. That file will contain the local rewrite rules, while .htaccess contains the server side ones.

Plastometer

Clever that last one there... Do I set the AccessFileName in the httpd.conf? Can I set them per virtual host too? – Blockbuster

AccessFileName actually supports more than one filename, so I could just add the following: AccessFileName local.htaccess .htaccess and regular .htaccess files would still work :) – Blockbuster

Answer 2

I ran across this while looking for a similar solution. While I didn't get RewriteBase to set conditionally, I did get a similar effect by setting an environment variable and using that in the following rules. Here's an example of what I mean.

# Set an environment variable based on the server name
RewriteRule %{SERVER_NAME} localhost [E=REWRITEBASE:/local_dir/]
RewriteRule %{SERVER_NAME} prodhost [E=REWRITEBASE:/prod_dir/]

# Allow any files or directories that exist to be displayed directly
RewriteCond %{ENV:REWRITEBASE}%{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f 
RewriteCond %{ENV:REWRITEBASE}%{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d 
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^static

# Rewrite all other URLs to index.php/URL
RewriteRule .* %{ENV:REWRITEBASE}index.php/$0 [PT]

Stephaniestephannie

Interesting... not sure I get what happens there though :p – Blockbuster

Well the base directory that I would normally set RewriteBase to get's saved to an environment variable ($REWRITEBASE). In the RewriteCond and RewriteRule, that variable is expanded and prefixed to the result. For example - if the server_name is localhost, the RewriteRule becomes .* /local_dir/index.php$0 [PT]. – Stephaniestephannie

I should note too that this is on Apache 2.2. I'm not sure how earlier versions would handle this. – Stephaniestephannie

Answer 3

If your htaccess file is in the installation base (ie next to index.php), then you don't particularly need RewriteBase, i leave it out of my applications and they work beautifully. Even with two Kohana installs, one inside the other directory.

Gregoriagregorian