htaccess redirect loop

Question

I'm trying to make my URLs look "nicer". Instead of x.com/reset-password/?email=name@x.com, I want it to be x.com/reset-password/name@x.com

Using mod_rewrite, I've gotten it to work for every relevant string except those with periods (.). When I allow dots in the RewriteRule statement, an internal server error occurs. I think it's because even when the L flag is applied, it must redirect one final time to the new destination and therefore going into an infinite loop since my regex is too lenient.

I'm trying to use a RewriteCond to stop any URIs with an equals sign from redirecting, thus solving the infinite loop problem, but it's not applying correctly. I'm asking for one of two solutions, I guess: either a way to include periods in the original regex or a way to stop URIs with = from being evaluated

The original regex:

RewriteRule ^([^.]+)$ ?email=$1 [L]

The modified one:

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^[^=]+$  
RewriteRule ^(.+)$ ?email=$1 [L]

I know there are a lot of regex/htaccess tutorials online (I've spent the last several hours reading them...), but I can't seem to figure it out. Any help is appreciated!

Answer 1

You should be using the QUERY_STRING instead of the REQUEST_URI since the = is in the QUERY_STRING:

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^[^=]+$  
RewriteRule ^(.+)$ ?email=$1 [L]