How can I write an .htaccess that will rewrite differently based on the request url?

Question

I would like to have one .htaccess file that can rewrite correctly on both my localhost development environment and on my hosted production site. Right now I have to keep two separate file copies for every site I work on. I would like to be able to synchronize the two sites without blowing away either one of their .htaccess files.

Below is the .htaccess file that I'm using with a little pseudo code in the comments to demonstrate what I want to do.

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteBase /

    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
    RewriteCond $1 !^(index\.php|images|robots\.txt|css)

## IF the url looks like its from localhost then use this rule
  ## The incoming url might look like: http://localhost/mysite/about
    RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /mysite/index.php/$1 [L]
## Else do this rewrite
  ## The incoming url might look like: http://www.mysite.com/about
    RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?/$1 [QSA,L]
</IfModule>

<IfModule !mod_rewrite.c>
    ErrorDocument 404 /index.php
</IfModule>

Here is my server configurations:

Development: xampp on windows

Production: Dreamhost

Answer 1

Use RewriteCond to check %{HTTP_HOST}. eg:

RewriteCond %{REMOTE_HOST}  ^localhost$

Answer 2

I'm a bit rusty on this, but I think:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.domain.com$ [NC]

#Do your live stuff here

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^localhost$ [NC]

#Do your local stuff here

Answer 3

I would just use a separate virtual host for your development environment with the same settings as your production server has.

Just add another <VirtualHost> container to your httpd.conf or httpd-vhosts.conf configuration file and adjust the settings:

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName example.com.local
    DocumentRoot /absolute/filesystem/path/to/your/localhost/mysite
</VirtualHost>