Whatever I do, .htaccess won't do the job

Question

Working with .htacess file has always been a very frustrating experience for me. Someone please help.

This is what I want to achieve:

I am running Ubuntu 14.04.
Redirect my entire site (example.com) to a maintenance.html page.
Block everybody else except one IP, for example, I need to allow only 123.456.789.0

Here are my files:

Location of my index.html is /var/www/html
Location of my maintenance.html is /var/www/html
Location of my .htaccess file is /var/www/html

Contents of My .htaccess file:

#Rewrite to www
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com[nc]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [r=301,nc]

#301 Redirect Old File
Redirect 301 /index.html /maintenance.html

#Block users by IP
order allow,deny
deny from all 
allow from 123.456.789.0

Please help me understand:

Is the location of each of the above files right? In what cases, the page ends up in 500 internal server error?
What changes should I make in
- /etc/apache2/apache.conf
- /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default.conf OR
- /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf
Is is necessary to run a2enmod rewrite?
Should I add <IfModule mod_rewrite.c> and </IfModule> as header and footer in any of the above config files?

Sorry for too many questions, but I really want know it all this time. Thanks in advance.

`deny from` without anything won't work. I guess this is a typo. — Olaf Dietsche, Jun 22 '16 at 07:32
Never test with [`R=301`](http://stackoverflow.com/a/9204355/1741542). Same goes for `Redirect`. — Olaf Dietsche, Jun 22 '16 at 07:39
The changes in the files depend on your system (debian, ubuntu, wamp - all have different default configs) - `Deny from` should be `Deny from All` — CodeBrauer, Jun 22 '16 at 07:48
@CodeBrauer I added the info. I am using Ubuntu 14.04. And I tried with `deny from all` and it still won't work. So I edited that part too. — Anand Surampudi, Jun 22 '16 at 07:51
And I tried with `deny from all` and it worked for the *IP Block* goal. But the Page Redirect still won't work. Thanks @CodeBrauer and @OlafDietsche . — Anand Surampudi, Jun 22 '16 at 07:57
When you block everyone but one IP, there's no point in showing a maintenance page. — Olaf Dietsche, Jun 22 '16 at 09:11
That makes so much sense. Now I see such a silly blunder on my part. I removed the IP block configuration and page redirection worked just fine. Thank you very much. This is the solution I needed. — Anand Surampudi, Jun 22 '16 at 09:20

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 22 '16 at 08:57

Is the location of each of the above files right? In what cases, the page ends up in 500 internal server error?

A "500 Internal Server Error" message means there's an error and you're expected to check the server logs for the exact details. Apache will not display the error message to be seen by everyone.

What changes should I make

It depends on what the problem is. If the problem is "500 Internal Server Error" that means that we still don't know what the problem is.

Is is necessary to run a2enmod rewrite?

That command enables mod_rewrite. You need to enable it if it isn't enabled. You don't need to enable it if it's already enabled.

It's worth noting that this command is not part of official Apache distribution. Some Linux distros (namely Debian and derivatives) change third-party packages to match their configuration preferences, as in this case.

Should I add <IfModule mod_rewrite.c> and </IfModule> as header and footer in any of the above config files?

As documentation explains, this block can be used to ignore directives when a given module is not installed. This can be useful for configuration templates to be distributed and optional features. In your case, it'll silently ignore your code if mod_rewrite is not available—you don't want that.

Last but not least:

order allow,deny
deny from all 
allow from 123.456.789.0

... belongs to the old (and really hard to understand) Apache/2.2 syntax. If you are using Apache/2.4* you may want to try Require.

(*) _{Some distros hate bundling recent software but 2.4 has been around for several years}

Yes, I am using Apache 2.4.7. I will try `Require`. `500 Internal Server Error` got solved when I looked at the apache error log. It was saying `/var/www/html/.htaccess: Invalid command '//Rewrite', perhaps misspelled or defined by a module not included in the server configuration`. So I modified that part. Everything is normal, apache has no more errors. But the page redirect to `maintenance.html` won't happen. Thanks a lot for your time on this @AlvaroGonzalez . — Anand Surampudi, Jun 22 '16 at 09:05

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 22 '16 at 09:31

Thanks to @OlafDietsche and @ÁlvaroGonzález for this quick help. I am keeping their suggestions here so somebody like me will find it useful.

The problem is with my goals, not with the syntax. With their comments and answers, I came to know that my 2 goals were mutually contradicting ones.

I configured .htaccess to do both page-redirection and IP block. But if I am blocking (almost) everybody from accessing the site, page redirection makes no sense.

The required configuration in .htaccess is:

  #Rewrite to www
  Options +FollowSymLinks
  RewriteEngine on
  RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com[nc]
  RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [r=301,nc]

  #301 Redirect Old File
  Redirect 301 /index.html /maintenance.html

Whatever I do, .htaccess won't do the job

2 Answers2