Replace plus (+) with dash (-) in Wordpress search

Question

How can i change the url plus(+) sign to dash(-) in url with htaccess. This is the code i have so far:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]+\ /(#[^?&\ ]*)?\?([^&\ ]*&)?s=([^&\ ]+)[^\ ]*\ HTTP/
RewriteRule ^$ http://example.com/search/%3\.html? [R=301,L]
</IfModule>

This works well and the result something like this: http://example.com/search/key+word.html

The only thing is that i want to change plus with dash. I would really appreciated if anyone can help out.

I'm not having a go, or telling you what to do, but wouldn't that take away the main point of a search string? it's showing a plus to show you that its searching for this word AND this word AND this word? — Lee, Sep 11 '14 at 07:53
The purpose of this string is for SEO and it's still showing the results for this word AND this word AND this word because I update the query.php file too. Thanks anyway — panjianom, Sep 11 '14 at 08:30

anubhava · Answer 1 · 2014-09-11T08:21:58.163

2

You can insert this code just below you 301 rule:

RewriteRule "^(search)/([^ +]*)[ +]+([^ +]*[ +].*)$" /$1/$2-$3 [L,NE]
RewriteRule "^(search)/([^ +]*)[ +]([^ +]*)$" /$1/$2-$3 [L,R=302,NE]

edited Sep 11 '14 at 08:21

answered Sep 11 '14 at 07:55

anubhava

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Thanks but I get 500 Internal Server Error. – panjianom Sep 11 '14 at 08:17
500 gone but it still showing plus (+) sign even I put it above 301 rule. – panjianom Sep 11 '14 at 08:39
It is working perfectly fine in my testing. Make sure this rule is just below your 301 rule. Also check in Firebug if some other rule is not putting `+`s back. – anubhava Sep 11 '14 at 09:52

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 11 '14 at 13:32

I decide to make it possible by using plugin with this code:

function seo_search_result() {
    if ( is_search() && strpos($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'], '/wp-admin/') === false && strpos($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'], '/search/') === false ) {
        wp_redirect(get_bloginfo('home') . '/search/' . str_replace(' ', '-', str_replace('%20', '-', get_query_var('s'). '.html')));
        exit();
    }
}

add_action('template_redirect', 'seo_search_result');

Replace plus (+) with dash (-) in Wordpress search

2 Answers2