mod_rewrite to 302 a blank query string

Question

I'm currently working with:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /somepath

RewriteRule ^/$ home [R]

I'd like to have requests of GET /somepath to redirect via 302 to /somepath/home. What am I missing here?

Answer 1

When using mod_rewrite in an .htaccess file, the base path is removed from the requested URL path before testing the patterns. That means /somepath (or rather /somepath/, since you’re actually in /somepath/) is removed so that the remaining path is empty. So:

RewriteRule ^$ home [R]