How can I remove the "?" from the url pattern in PHP

Question

Example: http://phpdiscussionboard.azurewebsites.net/?/dashboards/dashboard

How can I get rid of the ? in the URL pattern for my PHP app I've deployed via Azure? With it my routing doesn't work. When I manually remove the ? and send the URL request it works fine, but with the ? in the URL pattern it messes up my whole app.

@TheodoreRollinAnderson where is the link on your website, how is it getting there — iam-decoder, Nov 13 '15 at 05:43
but how does that work with the url i don't understand..is there some rule i can write in .htaccess file? — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 05:43
@iam-decoder anytime I make a post request with a form it automatically takes me back to the index and puts the "?" in the url — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 05:44
@TheodoreRollinAnderson there is, but any and all url querystrings would no longer work — iam-decoder, Nov 13 '15 at 05:44
then you need to find where the redirect is being executed and fix it there, if you find it and don't know what to do, post it here and we can help — iam-decoder, Nov 13 '15 at 05:45

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 13 '15 at 05:49

Considering you have to replace the first instance of a ?, you can use the following function:

function replaceFirst( $url, $to, $by ) {

    $url = explode( "/", $url );
    $arr = array();

    for( $i = 0; $i < count($url); $i++ ) {

        $current = $url[ $i ];
        if( $current == $to ) {
            if ( $by == "" ) { continue; }
            else { $current = $by; }
        } else if( $current == null ) { continue; }

        array_push( $arr, $current );

    }

    return implode( $arr, "/" );

}

And you can use it like this: replaceFirst("http://phpdiscussionboard.azurewebsites.net/?/dashboards/dashboard", "?", "") which will give you a value like: http:/phpdiscussionboard.azurewebsites.net/dashboards/dashboard. You can fix the minor error of the http:/ there, but this should be the logic.

I am really sorry if this is not the answer you're looking for, but the question you've asked is rather vague.

weirdpanda, thanks. that is great...i guess i'm just confused as to where i would put that function in my file structure. — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 05:55
You need to put it just before the routine which consumes the URL. — weirdpanda, Nov 13 '15 at 06:19
I figured it out. In config.php I turned enable query strings to false. — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 14:50

score -1 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 11:44

As Azure Web Apps uses IIS to host PHP applications, and we can leverage web.config to manage our site.

I found the similar requirement with you on stackoverflow, and I leverage this answer, convert the .htaccess content to web.config, then I test on Azure Web app, it works fine. But I haven't modified the settings of base_url and index_page in the config.php.

So create a file named web.confg with the following content in the root directory of your application: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <configuration> <system.webServer> <rewrite> <rules> <rule name="rule 1R" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^(.*)$" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="/index.php/{R:1}" /> </rule> </rules> </rewrite> </system.webServer> </configuration> And click the RESTART button at the bottom nav bar of your site manage portal.

Hi Gary, I modified my web.config to look like that, and my config.php base_url is = to ' ' and my index_page is equal to ' ' as well. When i hit login , the url it displays is: http://phpdiscussionboard.azurewebsites.net/?/dashboard when i want it to display http://phpdiscussionboard.azurewebsites.net/dashboard only. when i manually change the url to just dashboard, i am taken to the dashboard and can see that it did in fact log me in. — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 14:44
I figured it out. In config.php I turned enable query strings to false. — Theodore Rollin Anderson, Nov 13 '15 at 14:50

How can I remove the "?" from the url pattern in PHP

2 Answers2