mod_rewrite, avatar set up

Question

I'd like to use mod_rewrite to handle my requests of avatar images. I've got a folder containing all .png images and the file is named after the account's username.

So I would like requests for /avatar/Juddling, to show the image, /images/avatars/Juddling.png BUT if that file doesn't exist, I would like it to show a default.png image.

Options +FollowSymLinks
Options +Indexes
Options -MultiViews
RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/$1.png [NC]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/default.png [NC,L]

Apache only seems to be handling the first RewriteRule, as I'm getting a 404 if the avatar isn't there rather than seeing the default image.

Answer 1

Try it the other way round:

RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}images/avatars/$1.png -f
RewriteRule ^avatar/([^/]+)$ images/avatars/$1.png [L]
RewriteRule ^avatar/([^/]+)$ images/avatars/default.png [L]

Answer 2

%{REQUEST_FILENAME} doesn't get updated when you rewrite, remaining the original value, so you need to get a little fancy:

RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/$1.png [NC]
RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/images/avatars/$1.png !-f
RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/default.png [NC,L]

Answer 3

Try re-writting it so the test comes first such that:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/default.png [NC,L]

RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*)$ images/avatars/$1.png [NC,L]

Answer 4

Options +FollowSymLinks
Options -MultiViews

RewriteEngine On

RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/images/avatars/$1.png -f
RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*[^/])?$ /images/avatars/$1.png [L]
RewriteRule ^avatar/(.*[^/])?$ /images/avatars/default.png [L]

This code works! I've never really had a clue about regex but it's was the "(.*[^/])?" part that was causing the problem, I'm not sure what it mean but problem solved!

Thanks for your help guys!