Rewrite away PC's sub-directories

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   I've been working on this on an off for far too long, but as any of you who may work with regex and ISAPI_Rewite know, it's not easy to nail things down . . . even the folks at Helicon typically have to make several trial and error attempts to get things right.

So, I am really happy to announce that with a mere 5 lines of conditions/rules we've successfully "rewritten away" the top two sub-directories PC enforces so that all of your site content resolves to the web root!Some developers may find it desirable not to have to use these two sub-directories and would rather have the store resolved right in the web root of the domain.

However, to do this, you must have a host that provides Helicon's ISAPI_Rewrite (which is awesome for lots of other issues too) -- so you must have a VPS or dedicated server plan where you can install things on the server yourself, such as ISAPI_Rewrite. Shared hosting plans are not likely to offer this option unless you are with a "boutique" host such as Grey Beard Design Group or Web Merchant Services. 

If you have the option to use ISAPI_Rewrite, here is the code you will want to use in your .htaccess or httpd.ini file in your web root:

# Helicon ISAPI_Rewrite configuration file

# Version 3.1.0.42

RewriteEngine on

RewriteBase / 

# START: Mask the /productcart/pc/ directory structure and make all such URLs look like they are in the web root 

# Handle image directories as they are otherwise referenced from the web root:

RewriteRule ^(images/.*|catalog/.*)$ productcart/pc/$1 [NC,L] 

RewriteRule ^(UPSLicense/.*|CAPTCHA/.*)$ productcart/$1 [NC,L]

# Handle javascrits as they are otherwise reference above the web root:

RewriteRule ^(includes/.*)$ productcart/$1 [NC,L]

# Handle objects called via ../pc/ when already in the /pc/ folder:

RewriteRule ^pc/(.*)$ productcart/pc/$1 [NC,L] 

# Permanently redirect all pages that were using subdirectories:

RewriteRule ^productcart/pc/(.*)$ $1 [NE,NC,R=301,L]

# Handle having all pages resolve in the web root without subdirectories:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f 

RewriteRule ^([^/]+)$ productcart/pc/$1 [NC,L]

# END: Mask the /productcart/pc/ directory structure and make all such URLs look like they are in the web root 

What's more, if you would find it desirable to maintain the first sub-directory as a way of adding some key word relevance to your URLs, the script can be easily adapted to provide for that.

Finally, it's possible that you may have customized some things in your design differently than this set up rules will handle. If that is the case you should maybe be able to follow the example above, but if not and you have trouble with the regex, please PM me.

PS: This post is not intended to make any claim that rewriting away the sub-directories would improve SEO. The options here are provided as just that: options so that you can make your own decisions on how best to SEOptimize your store. 

EDIT: Correct for v4 One Page Checkout -- added handling for the JQuery and Spry subdirectories.

EDIT: Simplified rules for the previous edit -- should have just done it like this in the first place, LOL!

EDIT: Just confirmed that this full set of conditions and rules will NOT work with versions of ISAPI_Rewrite prior to 3.1.0.43. Curent version as of 02/12/2010 is 3.1.0.69

EDIT: Fixed a minor wrinkle with location of UPS logo in v4 OPC

EDIT: Fixed a minor wrinkle with location of CAPTCHA images

EDIT: Simplified the conditions to anything that gets put into the /productcart/includes/ folder

EDIT: Added fix introduced by v4.1 calling objects by ../pc/ when already in the /pc/ folder

Edited by Sean@WMS - 23-September-2010 at 6:08pm