.htaccess question for search friendly URL's

[Crimm]

Hi there

So ... I want dynamics to be in the root of my web folder and have vB be in a forum sub directory.

The question I have is that when I turn on Spider Friendly URL's and use the provided .htaccess ... I can't get to the forums anymore, because the .htaccess is trying to rewrite it.

Here's the current .htaccess:

Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/robots\.txt$ robots.txt [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^members/page([0-9]+).html$ index.php?page=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/entries/([0-9]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ /browsecategory.php?do=newentries&cutoffdate=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/entries/(([0-9]|-)+/?)$ /browsecategory.php?do=newentries&cutoffdate=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/entries/?$ /browsecategory.php?do=newentries [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/posts/([0-9]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ /browsecategory.php?do=newposts&cutoffdate=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/posts/([0-9]+)$ /browsecategory.php?do=newposts&cutoffdate=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatsnew/posts/?$ /browsecategory.php?do=newposts [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^whatspopular/([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/$ /browsecategory.php?do=popentries&orderby=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^members/([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ /browsecategory.php?do=member&userrewrite=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^members/(([a-zA-Z_0-9]|-)+/?)$ /browsecategory.php?do=member&userrewrite=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/members/([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ /browsecategory.php?userrewrite=$2&catrewrite=$1&page=$3 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/members/(([a-zA-Z_0-9]|-)+/?)$ /browsecategory.php?userrewrite=$2&catrewrite=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/(([a-zA-Z_0-9]|-)+)/$ showentry.php?entryrewrite=$2&catrewrite=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ showentry.php?entryrewrite=$2&catrewrite=$1&page=$3 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/epage([0-9]+).html$ showentry.php?entryrewrite=$2&catrewrite=$1&epage=$3 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/page([0-9]+).html$ /browsecategory.php?catrewrite=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z_0-9\-]+)/?$ /browsecategory.php?catrewrite=$1 [QSA,L]

I tried adding exceptions by adding the following rule at the top:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !/forum [NC]

and

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/forum [NC]

With and without a trailing slash

and I tried:

RewriteRule ^/forum - [L]

Since I don't know rewrite rules good enough ... I'm stabbing in the dark here.

Can anyone help me out?

Thank you.

[Crimm]

I ended up just moving my dynamics to a subcategory.

[Crimm]

I figured out this issue tonight, so I thought I would post here in case someone has the same issue.

If you are trying to put the dynamics in the root directory and use the SEO .htaccess file, then you will find that your forum directory also get's caught up in the .htaccess rewriterules.

To combat this add this line:

rewriterule ^forum/ - [L]

Directly under the rewrite engine on line. Like this:

Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine On
rewriterule ^forum/ - [L]

Where forum stands for the subdirectory where your forum is located.