htaccess folder rewrite

I've been reading multiple posts on here about htaccess folder rewriting but none seem to fit my question (properly).

My question is:

I have 2 sub folders on the server, website1 and website2.

When a开发者_运维知识库 user goes to www.foo.com I wish the visual url to remain the same but want the server URI to go to /website1/ where it will load the index.php for website1

I then want the same thing only when a user goes to www.bar.com again the url does not change but this time it links to /website2/ where it will load the index.php for the 2nd website.

Would really appreciate some help with this as I'm still learning about rewrites. Examples with explanations would be highly appreciated. Also any advice of best practice (if their is any) would also be appreciated.

KingCrunch is right -- the proper way to setup such environment is to use <VirtualHost> directive in Apache config file.

If, for whatever reason this needs to be dona via rewrite and .htaccess .. then you need mod_rewrite to be enabled and .htaccess files to be allowed to contain rewrite rule (AllowOverride directive).

Here are the rules:

Options +FollowSymLinks -MultiViews
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /

# rule #1
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} =www.foo.com
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/website1/
RewriteRule (.*) /website1/$1 [L]

# rule #2
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} =www.bar.com
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/website2/
RewriteRule (.*) /website2/$1 [L]

This code is to be placed in .htaccess file in root folder. If placed elsewhere (e.g. configuration or virtual host context) some tweaking may be required.

Fist rule is for www.foo.com and second for another domain name. These rules are pretty much the same. We tell Apache to check domain name (via {HTTP_HOST} request variable), and if it matches our domain rewrite (internal redirect) URL into one folder deeper. The second condition is to prevent a rewrite loop (to not to rewrite already rewritten URL). It is necessary as Apache, after executing rewrite, goes to the next rewrite iteration (that is how it works), and this condition is required to stop the loop.

Useful link: http://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/rewrite/

I believe that you need to use only RewriteCond and RewriteRule directives. Take a look 'Virtual User Hosts' at http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/misc/rewriteguide.html. The logical is the same. (I think.)