Thanks for the tip!!

I installed friendly urls and everything seems to work ok. The links for each post on the main page point to friendly urls, but the urls they point to do not exist (i.e. when clicked they go to nowhere).

Am I missing something?

I'm having problems with this.... the instructions say "Copy the .htaccess file in this add-on to the root folder of your Vanilla installation."

But there's only one file, the readme, in the FriendlyUrls folder. Is there stuff in .htaccess or is it just a blank file?

By default on linux, the files with a dot at the start of the name are hiden. with a shell access you can see that hiden files with ls -a.

If you use a ftp program, There might be an option to see that hidden files

If .htaccess is in the root folder of vanilla and it is still doesn't work, the setting of your server doesn't let you change the setting with .htaccess. If you have access to the httpd.conf check for the AllowOverride directives. Or better, if you can edit httpd.conf, add the rules in a Directory directive:


#Check mod_rewrite is on.
#For apache 2.x, if you don't see this line, add it (or uncomment it).
#For apache 1.3, check your manual.
...
LoadModule rewrite_module modules/mod_rewrite.so
...

<Directory /Path/to/forum/htdocs>
Order allow,deny
allow from all

RewriteEngine On
Options +FollowSymLinks

#Discussions
RewriteRule ^discussions/$ index.php [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^discussions/([0-9]+)/$ index.php?page=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([0-9]+)/$ index.php?CategoryID=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)/$ index.php?CategoryID=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]

#Comments
RewriteRule ^discussion/([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)/(.*)/$ comments.php?DiscussionID=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^discussion/([0-9]+)/(.*)/$ comments.php?DiscussionID=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^discussion/([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)/$ comments.php?DiscussionID=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^discussion/([0-9]+)/$ comments.php?DiscussionID=$1 [QSA,L]

#Categories
RewriteRule ^categories/$ categories.php [QSA,L]

#Account
RewriteRule ^account/$ account.php [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^account/([0-9]+)/$ account.php?u=$1 [QSA,L]

#Search
RewriteRule ^search/$ search.php [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^search/([0-9]+)/$ search.php?page=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^search/saved/([0-9]+)/$ search.php?SearchID=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^search/saved/([0-9]+)/([0-9]+)/$ search.php?SearchID=$1&page=$2 [QSA,L]

#Post
RewriteRule ^post/$ post.php [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^post/([0-9]+)/$ post.php?CommentID=$1 [QSA,L]
RewriteRule ^post/category/([0-9]+)/$ post.php?CategoryID=$1 [QSA,L]

#Settings
RewriteRule ^settings/$ settings.php [QSA,L]

#People
RewriteRule ^people/$ people.php [QSA,L]
<Directory>

Restart apache.

probably a stupid question.

[oh, it was ...]

What if you can't edit httpd.conf?

could one substitute "Options +FollowSymLinks" with something else ...
.. like "Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch"? FollowSymLinks not allowed by virt host provider