Avoid infinite loop with 301 redirects

Question

I'm using .htaccess to redirect

http://www.example.com/foo/

to

http://www.example.com/foo/bar

This is my code:

redirect 301 /foo/ http://www.example.com/foo/bar

However this produces a feedback loop, something like

http://www.example.com/foo/barbarbarbarbarbar etc.

I've tried placing delimiters around it:

redirect 301 ^/foo/$ http://www.example.com/foo/bar

but then the redirect simply doesn't take place. I'm probably missing some very simple point of syntax. Any ideas? Thanks.

EDIT

Here's my (almost) full .htaccess file:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /

# Canonical is www version
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www.example.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [L,R=301]

#redirect => http unless special page
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} on
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(javascripts|images|library|stylesheets)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]

#redirect => https for special pages
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]

# send to router
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [L]

Do you have more rules in this .htaccess? If yes then show full .htaccess here. — anubhava, Mar 20 '15 at 10:29

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 20 '15 at 10:48

Have your rules like this:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /

# Canonical is www version
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.example\.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^ http://www.example.com%{REQUEST_URI} [L,R=301]

#redirect => http unless special page
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} on
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} !/(javascripts|images|library|stylesheets)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]

#redirect => https for special pages
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule !^index\.php$ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301,L]

RewriteRule ^foo/?$ /foo/bar [L,NC,R=301]

# send to router
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^ index.php [L]

make sure to test this in a new browser or clear your browser cache before testing.

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 30 '17 at 09:37

For your information, it really depends on your hosting provider. It may be behind a Load Balancer and you don't have the proper env var set (like HTTPS and others...).

In my case (Infomaniak), nothing actually worked and I got infinite redirect loop.

The right way to do this for Infomaniak is actually explained in their support site:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP:X-Forwarded-Proto} !https
RewriteRule (.*) https://your-domain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

So, always check with your hosting provider. Hopefully they have an article explaining how to do this. Otherwise, just ask the support.

Tony · Answer 3 · 2015-03-20T09:36:33.123

0

It depends on what is the resource that you want to expose with your redirect. Is it a file or a directory.

if you would expose a directory under bar you should try :

RedirectMatch 301 ^/foo/ http://www.example.com/foo/bar/

if you would redirect to a file you should use this syntax :

redirect 301 /foo http://www.example.com/foo/bar

you can see this post for more informations

edited Mar 20 '15 at 09:36

answered Mar 20 '15 at 09:25

Tony

482
4
13

As I said, the first one produces a feedback loop. As it happens, so does the second one. – GluePear Mar 20 '15 at 09:27
Take attention on the slash characters. – Tony Mar 20 '15 at 09:28
It still produces a feedback loop. – GluePear Mar 20 '15 at 09:31
sorry I've edit my post to use the correct syntax for directory redirect. It was an error in my first answer. – Tony Mar 20 '15 at 09:38
This fails to redirect (as in my question, where I used `^` in an attempt to delimit the `foo` part of the URI). – GluePear Mar 20 '15 at 09:54
it also append with RedirectMatch ? – Tony Mar 20 '15 at 09:57
Sorry, missed that. No, with RedirectMatch it causes another redirect loop. – GluePear Mar 20 '15 at 10:01
Is http://www.example.com/foo/bar point to a folder or on a file ? you should not redirect a folder path to a file path – Tony Mar 20 '15 at 10:03
Neither -- they are purely symbolic names which are handled by a router. – GluePear Mar 20 '15 at 10:24

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Jul 18 '15 at 00:13

0

Instead of using redirect, you can use passthrough.

RewriteRule ^/foo$ /foo/bar [PT]

answered Jul 18 '15 at 00:13

Sujith Mohan

181
1
7

Avoid infinite loop with 301 redirects

4 Answers4