Wrong RewriteRule in a local Multisite installation

[Guy_fr]

• WampServer on Windows 8
• Install Wordpress in a subdirectory of the document root(here a directory "multitest")
• Setup multisite in subfolder mode.

Rules displayed for .htaccess in the wordpress textarea of the network page are:

RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) c:\wamp\www\multitest/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ c:\wamp\www\multitest/$2 [L]

Result in the browser window of a subsite admin board is an error:

Forbidden You don't have permission to access /multitest/C:wampwwwmultitest/wp-admin/ on this server.

For the subsite itself, at least paths for css are broken.

RewriteRules should be:

RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) /multitest/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ /multitest/$2 [L]

Looking at code source in network.php, I fixed it for my personal use by adding: $rewrite_base = $base; before the htaccess code is displayed to users.

This could be done with local multisite installation only.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Moving for investigation.

[alexvorn2]

I think that local installation is not for multisite

[Guy_fr]

Replying to alexvorn2:

I think that local installation is not for multisite

By design, in source code and documentation, only subdomain multisite installation is forbidden. Subdirectories installations are allowed.

Trouble is only in the suggest for the .htaccess file in the dashboard.

[wpmuguru]

@Guy_fr - what was your hostname? IP address, localhost, etc. ?

[SergeyBiryukov]

Related: #23104

[evansolomon]

Looking through the way those rules are generated, it's not immediately obvious (to me) why it doesn't work. I don't have a windows machine/VM to test on. It would be useful to know what all of the variables around here are when it fails: ​http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser/trunk/wp-admin/network.php?rev=23245#L312

[evansolomon]

Replying to SergeyBiryukov:

Related: #23104

This seems like a likely culprit. Does stuff like $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] use unix-style paths even on windows? If so, that would be an obvious reason it would break, and the patch from #23104 looks like it would fix it.

[wpmuguru]

Replying to evansolomon:

Replying to SergeyBiryukov:

Related: #23104

This seems like a likely culprit. Does stuff like $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] use unix-style paths even on windows? If so, that would be an obvious reason it would break, and the patch from #23104 looks like it would fix it.

The document root is quite possibly c:\wamp\www\. I'm wondering if Wamp has a similar situation to having PHP-CGI without the fix_path_info flag set in the PHP config.

[guy_fr]

Replying to evansolomon:

Replying to SergeyBiryukov:

Related: #23104

This seems like a likely culprit. Does stuff like $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] use unix-style paths even on windows? If so, that would be an obvious reason it would break, and the patch from #23104 looks like it would fix it.

First, Happy new year :)

Actual configuration is:

$_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]: C:/wamp/www
realpath($_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]): C:\wamp\www
ABSPATH: C:\wamp\www\multitest/
slashed_home: http://localhost/multitest/
$base: /multitest/

with the #23104 patch, local variables in the network_step2 function will become:

$wp_dir_from_root: \multitest/
$wp_siteurl_subdir: /\multitest/
$rewrite_base: \multitest/

Which is not correct as the suggest lines in the .htacces will be:

RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) \multitest/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ \multitest/$2 [L]

One fix could be to replace \ by / in the call to the global ABSPATH variable when building the $wp_dir_from_root:

$wp_dir_from_root  = preg_replace( '#^' . preg_quote( $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'], '#' ) . '#', '', preg_replace('/\\\\/', '/', ABSPATH));

with that fix, local variables in the fucntion will be:

$wp_dir_from_root: /multitest/
$wp_siteurl_subdir: /
$rewrite_base: 

and in the suggest for .htaccess file, you will find:

RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) $2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ $2 [L]

which is not breaking acces to secondary site when installing on a windows local machine.

[Rarst]

Hit same issue. This is not caused by symlink in my case, but by where data is taken from - causing separator mismatch that makes $wp_dir_from_root = preg_replace( '#^' . preg_quote( $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'], '#' ) . '#', '', ABSPATH ); replacement produce incorrect result (absolute path).

• ABSPATH is defined as dirname(__FILE__) which is generated by PHP
• $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] seems to be taken verbatim from Apache configuration

Naturally there is no guarantee that the two use the same separator convention. Can't even rely on OS to determine which one Apache config uses since it can be typed in freeform.

So either data needs to come from compatible sources or separators need to be force equalized before running replacement.

[guy_fr]

Replying to Rarst:

Hit same issue. This is not caused by symlink in my case, but by where data is taken from - causing separator mismatch that makes $wp_dir_from_root = preg_replace( '#^' . preg_quote( $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'], '#' ) . '#', '', ABSPATH ); replacement produce incorrect result (absolute path).

• ABSPATH is defined as dirname(__FILE__) which is generated by PHP
• $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] seems to be taken verbatim from Apache configuration

Naturally there is no guarantee that the two use the same separator convention. Can't even rely on OS to determine which one Apache config uses since it can be typed in freeform.

So either data needs to come from compatible sources or separators need to be force equalized before running replacement.

That is right, and I think the better fix would be to change all ABSPATH definitions to ensure separators are the same everywhere, better than only change in one place as I described previously. Something like that:

define( 'ABSPATH', preg_replace('/\\\\/', '/', dirname(__FILE__) . '/'));

but.... ABSPATH is used in so many places that it could be "dangerous" to modify that.

[dd32]

It's pretty common to see str_replace( '\\', '/', $path) elsewhere in core where we deal with filesystem paths.

I'd be +1 for standardising ABSPATH on windows to / as well as doing the same for any paths in $_SERVER which we use. Windows is very forgiving and accepts either slash, and AFAIK, doesn't believe in using \ as an escape character in paths. IIS on the other hand, may need checking to see if it complains.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Confirmed the issue. The current code was introduced in [22042].

23073.patch​ should fix this ticket along with #23104.

[guy_fr]

patch looking good for me.

[westi]

I just visited network.php on my trunk MS in subdir install on OS X:

The rewrite rules in generates are also broken :(

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /~peter/trunk.ms/
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# uploaded files
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?files/(.+) Users/peter/Sites/trunk.ms/wp-includes/ms-files.php?file=$2 [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) Users/peter/Sites/trunk.ms/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ Users/peter/Sites/trunk.ms/$2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[westi]

If I go back to [22041] then my OS X localhost install generates the right rules again. With [22042] they are broken.

Basically, $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] is about as useful as a pile of tribbles.

For example when you use mod_userdir the DOCUMENT_ROOT is not the root folder of the files at all and also the symlink issue highlighted in #23104.

We probably need to go back to divining the root of the server a different way.

[nacin]

Okay. I had a patch on #22639 that removed DOCUMENT_ROOT from the equation, by using get_home_path() (which uses SCRIPT_FILENAME, but that seems to be working just fine for existing get_home_path() uses). attachment:ticket:22639:22639.2.diff​

[nacin]

23073.diff​ is the refreshed patch from #22639. Untested.

get_home_path() already standardizes slashes, too.

[westi]

Replying to nacin:

23073.diff​ is the refreshed patch from #22639. Untested.

get_home_path() already standardizes slashes, too.

This works on my OS X with mod_userdir setup and generates the same rules as pre [22042]

[SergeyBiryukov]

Tested 23073.diff​ in a subdirectory on Windows, looks good.

[nacin]

Great. Let's get as much testing/review on this as possible, Lots of environmental variables here, and a lot of PHP variables too.

[ryan]

23073.diff busts a lot of links, notably network admin ones.

htaccess without 23073.diff:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

With 23073.diff:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) Users/ryan/Dropbox/htdocs/wpsubdir/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ Users/ryan/Dropbox/htdocs/wpsubdir/$2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[ryan]

ABSPATH: /Users/ryan/Dropbox/htdocs/wpsubdir/wordpress/

get_home_path(): /Users/ryan/Dropbox/htdocs/wpsubdir/

[SergeyBiryukov]

In 23073.diff​, seems that $home_path and ABSPATH should be swapped in line 316.

[nacin]

Correct, I had the variables flipped in the patch. 23073.2.diff​ looks proper. Curious why it was reported as working by westi.

[ryan]

23073.2.diff fixes the issues I saw.

[ryan]

Looks good when WP isn't in a subdir. I don't have things set up to test subdomains, however.

[markjaquith]

Does not work with subdomains with WP is in a subdir.

Expected:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# uploaded files
RewriteRule ^files/(.+) wp/wp/wp-includes/ms-files.php?file=$1 [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^wp-admin$ wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wp/wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*\.php)$ wp/wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

I get:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# uploaded files
RewriteRule ^files/(.+) wp-includes/ms-files.php?file=$1 [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^wp-admin$ wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) $1 [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*\.php)$ $1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[markjaquith]

Removing commit, as it regresses.

[guy_fr]

the ​23073.2.diff was correct for me with subdomains and wordpress in its own directory (except that it should have the fix for mismatching separators: str_replace('\\', '/', ...) on ABSPATH and $home_path )

Wordpress is installed in a subdir "wp":

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^wp-admin$ wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*\.php)$ wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[SergeyBiryukov]

How does 23073.3.diff​ look like? Tested with the examples above.

[markjaquith]

Still wrong:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# uploaded files
RewriteRule ^files/(.+) wp-includes/ms-files.php?file=$1 [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^wp-admin$ wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) $1 [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*\.php)$ $1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[nacin]

Everyone/anyone, please test 23073.7.2.diff​ on every setup you have. Please be specific as to the setup, as it concerns both server setup and WP network setup. That could include (not limited to) any combination of the following:

• Windows Apache
• mod_userdir
• IIS
• An install where WordPress is in a subdirectory, like /wordpress (be sure to report whether home == siteurl for your main site)
• Installs configured for subdomains and subdirectories (we need to test both)

Please confirm not only that the rewrite rules are correct, but that the instructions tell you to edit the right .htaccess or web.config file. As markjaquith did above, please paste the .htaccess rules here if you have issues or are unsure. As also done above, please provide your values for $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'], $_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'], ABSPATH, get_home_path(), etc.

[westi]

I'm going to call "unit-tests" here!

It seems pretty obvious that while we do this testing we should collect the ENV vars that we are using as nacin mentions above and then take these a build some unit tests around this code.

This is probably 3.6 material with a slight refactor to make the code testable but it seems pretty important to do so we can change the code in future and feel confident about not having to test 10's of different configurations including ones we might not always have setup like Windows.

[guy_fr]

test with ​23073.7.2.diff​

Conf:

• Windows Apache local virtual host (​http://test_subd.loc)
• Wordpress multisite, subdomain and installed in its own dir "wp"

Global env:
$_SERVER["SCRIPT_FILENAME"]: C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd/wp/wp-admin/network/setup.php
$_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]: C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd
$document_root_fix: C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd
ABSPATH: C:\wamp\www\wordpress\test_subd\wp/
$abspath_fix: C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd/wp/
get_home_path(): C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd/
get_option(home): http://test_subd.loc
get_option(siteurl): http://test_subd.loc/wp

local vars:
$base: /
$home_path: C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd/
$wp_siteurl_subdir: wp/
$rewrite_base: wp/

file .htaccess

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^wp-admin$ wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*\.php)$ wp/$1 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

Note, in the next line, url to the folder should use $abspath_fix instead of ABSPATH:

Add the following to your wp-config.php file in C:\wamp\www\wordpress\test_subd\wp/ above the line reading /* That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging. */:

[guy_fr]

test with ​23073.7.2.diff​

Conf:

• Windows Apache localhost
• Wordpress multisite, Path-based installation (subfolder install) and core installed in a "multitest" directory
• Works as expected

Global env:
$_SERVER["SCRIPT_FILENAME"]: C:/wamp/www/multitest/wp-admin/network/setup.php
$_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]: C:/wamp/www
$document_root_fix: C:/wamp/www
ABSPATH: C:\wamp\www\multitest/
$abspath_fix: C:/wamp/www/multitest/
get_home_path(): C:\wamp\www\multitest/
get_option(home): http://localhost/multitest
get_option(siteurl): http://localhost/multitest

local vars:
$base: /multitest/
$home_path: C:/wamp/www/multitest/
$wp_siteurl_subdir:
$rewrite_base: 

file .htaccess:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /multitest/
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) $2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ $2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

[guy_fr]

looking at the two previous comments, it seems that get_home_path() does not return the same delimitors if siteurl and home are identical or not.

• identical : get_home_path(): C:\wamp\www\multitest/
• not identical: get_home_path(): C:/wamp/www/wordpress/test_subd/

[Rarst]

Test with 23073.7.2.diff​

• Windows
• Apache
• locally mapped dev.rarst.net domain
• subdir multisite
• core in /wordpress

Data:

ABSPATH                     => C:\server\www\dev\wordpress/
$_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'] => C:/server/www/dev/wordpress/wp-admin/network/setup.php
$_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT']   => C:/server/www/dev/
get_home_path()             => C:\server\www\dev\wordpress/
get_option('siteurl')       => http://dev.rarst.net
get_option('home')          => http://dev.rarst.net
hostname                    => dev.rarst.net
slashed_home                => http://dev.rarst.net/
base                        => /
document_root_fix           => C:/server/www/dev
abspath_fix                 => C:/server/www/dev/wordpress/
home_path                   => C:/server/www/dev/
wp_siteurl_subdir           => wordpress/
rewrite_base                => wordpress/

Generated .htaccess:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]

# uploaded files
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?files/(.+) wordpress/wp-includes/ms-files.php?file=$2 [L]

# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

Result:

• .htaccess rules work
• .htaccess location is detected correctly

[wpmuguru]

23073.7.2.diff worked fine on nginx & Fast-CGI.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Replying to guy_fr:

looking at the two previous comments, it seems that get_home_path() does not return the same delimitors if siteurl and home are identical or not.

Right. When siteurl and home are identical, it falls back to ABSPATH:
​http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser/tags/3.5/wp-admin/includes/file.php#L84

We should probably make it always return consistent slashes in 3.6.

[markjaquith]

In 23295:

Resolve DOCUMENT_ROOT symlinks and standardize Windows slashing for various paths related to Multisite rewrite rule generation. props SergeyBiryukov, nacin, wpewill. fixes #23104 and #23073 for trunk

[markjaquith]

In 23296:

Resolve DOCUMENT_ROOT symlinks and standardize Windows slashing for various paths related to Multisite rewrite rule generation. props SergeyBiryukov, nacin, wpewill. fixes #23104 and #23073 for 3.5

[SergeyBiryukov]

Replying to SergeyBiryukov:

We should probably make it always return consistent slashes in 3.6.

Follow-up: #23175

[SergeyBiryukov]

#23218 was marked as a duplicate.

[wycks]

Edit I can confirm 23073.7.2.diff​ does work, I was looking in the wrong spot.

Stats:
Windows 8
WAMP Version 2
Core in /multisite
Network site uses /en

Url: http://dev.work/multisite
ABSPATH:  D:\Sites\MultiSite/
$_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME']: D:/Sites/MultiSite/wp-admin/network/index.php
$_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] D:/Sites
get_home_path D:/Sites/MultiSite/
get_option('siteurl') http://dev.work/multisite
get_option('home') http://dev.work/multisite