"Nice URLs" - how to implement it in PHP?

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  • WebCM
    #1

    "Nice URLs" - how to implement it in PHP?

    How to apply nice URL-s into CMS?

    1. Should we use nice urls for every page?

    2. Do we need to put a FULL path into <a href="">?

    3. What is faster and better?

    a) 10 rules in .htaccess which redirect you to normal URLs with GET
    parameters

    b) one rule in .htaccess and parsing "nice url" in PHP (strpos,
    explode...).

    4. Do search engines still deal with "nice urls" better than with
    normal URLs in 2008?

    5. When we must put more parameters into GET and only some of them
    occurs in one request - should we place them in "nice url" or should
    we better do something like: index.php/nice/url?param=value ?

    Why are "nice urls" better than normal? How to implement them in CMS?
    Example path:

    - example.com/pathtosite/index.php/art/50
    - example.com/pathtosite/art/50

    Are they correct? So...

    $_URL = explode(...); - good solution?

    Or maybe some rules for the most important pages are enough and we
    don't need to parse URLs in PHP?
    Tags: None
    • Rik Wasmus
      #2
      Re: &quot;Nice URLs&quot; - how to implement it in PHP?

      On Thu, 06 Mar 2008 16:45:38 +0100, WebCM <webcm123@gmail .comwrote:
      How to apply nice URL-s into CMS?
      Apache mod_rewrite (ask in alt.apache.conf iguraion if you run into
      troubles.
      1. Should we use nice urls for every page?
      Preferably, yes.
      2. Do we need to put a FULL path into <a href="">?
      Depends, if content can change location/hierarchy, yes, that is to say,
      use <a href="/path/to/something/">, not <a href="../something/">. You
      don't need the http and domain portion in it.
      3. What is faster and better?
      >
      a) 10 rules in .htaccess which redirect you to normal URLs with GET
      parameters
      >
      b) one rule in .htaccess and parsing "nice url" in PHP (strpos,
      explode...).
      b) is certainly more flexible (and is what I use), but has some overhead
      as you delegate a lot ot 401's to PHP. Which one is faster depends highly
      on the logic used, I'd say: try it out.
      4. Do search engines still deal with "nice urls" better than with
      normal URLs in 2008?
      They do a lot better with 'not nice urls' then they used to, however,
      having the actual keyword(s) searched for in the URL is definitly a plus..
      And you don't only change the URRLS's for the search engine, but also for
      humans (guessable & rememberable URLS, certainly a plus when for instance
      advertising in print, but in a browser context also a plus.)
      5. When we must put more parameters into GET and only some of them
      occurs in one request - should we place them in "nice url" or should
      we better do something like: index.php/nice/url?param=value ?
      If you can change it to keywords searched for, having them in the path
      portion has it's advantages. It they don't hold easily guessable
      parameters interpretable by humans, just use the query string.
      Why are "nice urls" better than normal?
      - Better scoring on keywords.
      - Not related to the actual type of script or technology used (php, .NET,
      Perl, Python), so it's easier to maintain the same URLs for all content,
      even after a major refactoring ('nice urls don't change')
      - Guessable by humans
      - Easy to remember by humans
      How to implement them in CMS?
      Example path:
      >
      - example.com/pathtosite/index.php/art/50
      - example.com/pathtosite/art/50
      >
      Are they correct? So...
      >
      $_URL = explode(...); - good solution?
      >
      Or maybe some rules for the most important pages are enough and we
      don't need to parse URLs in PHP?
      Depends on the actual goal, I just feed the path portion of
      $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] directly into a query which gives me the page used
      from a Nested Set Model table. Has some overhead, but most sites I workon
      are complex enough to benefit from it.
      --
      Rik Wasmus

        Comment

        • Toby A Inkster
          #3
          Re: &quot;Nice URLs&quot; - how to implement it in PHP?

          WebCM wrote:
          1. Should we use nice urls for every page?
          "Nice things are nicer than nasty ones."
          -- _Lucky Jim_, Kingsley Amis.
          2. Do we need to put a FULL path into <a href="">?
          I tend to use a root-relative path (i.e. one starting with "/").
          3. What is faster and better?
          >
          a) 10 rules in .htaccess which redirect you to normal URLs with GET
          parameters
          b) one rule in .htaccess and parsing "nice url" in PHP (strpos,
          explode...).
          Which is faster? Probably not much difference. mod_rewrite rules in
          httpd.conf will beat both though.

          I tend to just redirect all requests (except a few specific directories
          for CSS files, images, downloads, etc) to "index.php/*" and then PHP logic
          can deal with them.

          --
          Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
          [Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
          [OS: Linux 2.6.17.14-mm-desktop-9mdvsmp, up 37 days, 18:16.]
          [Now Playing: Ed Harcourt - The Trapdoor]

          Bottled Water
          Page not found - Tobyinkster
          http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2008/02/18/bottled-water/

            Comment

            • WebCM
              #4
              Re: &quot;Nice URLs&quot; - how to implement it in PHP?

              IMPORTANT: URLs like index.php/something/after may not work. It
              depends on server configuration. If admin disable PATH_INFO, URLs like
              this will cause 404 error.

                Comment

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