.htaccess is short for Hypertext Access.
.htaccess has no file name and it starts with a period and ends with the extension.
.htaccess file is a configuration file used by Apache based web servers, and is used for configuring the details of your website without altering the server configuration files.
The file is a hidden plain text file and is used to control the directory in which it resides, as well as the subdirectories below.
Example functionalities of .htaccess:
- Ability to block specific IP address from being able to view your website
- create and use custom error pages
- Create a clean and friendly URL
- Domain redirects
- Disable directory listing
- Hiding file extension
The ability to block/ban specific IP address
Block individual IP address:
order allow, deny deny from 192.168.110.100 deny from 235.70.120.110 deny from 131.12.168.85 allow from all
Block a range of IP address:
order allow, deny deny from 192.168. deny from 110.1.1. allow from all
Create and use custom error pages
- 400 – Bad request
- 401 – Authorization Required
- 403 – Forbidden
- 404 – File Not Found
- 500 – Internal Server Error
ErrorDocument 400 /errors/badrequest.html ErrorDocument 401 /errors/authreq.html ErrorDocument 403 /errors/forbidden.html ErrorDocument 404 /errors/filenotfound.html ErrorDocument 500 /errors/internalservererror.html
Disable directory listing
Options All -Indexes
Domain redirect ie. olddomain.com to www.newdomain.com
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^olddomain.com
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.newdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]
Hiding file extension
http://www.mywebsite.com/index.html to http://www.mywebsite.com/index
RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^([^/.]+)/?$ $1.html
Create a clean and friendly URL
RewriteEngine On RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z0-9]+)$ index.php?page=$1 RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z0-9]+)/$ index.php?page=$1
