.htaccess mod_rewrite dynamic match with Yii generated urls - apache

Question

I'm trying to use Apache's mod_rewrite module to make dynamically generated urls from a Yii app, which always contain index.php as the router/bootstrap, into static urls through .htaccess available to browse through a web browser.
Example: localhost/projectname/index.php/commentfeed.xml is the dynamically generated page, but I want it to be able to be accessed through localhost/projectname/commentfeed.xml
Apache version I'm running is: Apache/2.4.4 (Win32) OpenSSL/1.0.1e PHP/5.5.0 through XAMPP for my development platform. The mod_rewrite module is present and loaded in Apache's httpd.conf file.
My .htaccess in localhost/projectname/ is as follows:
#Turning on the rewrite engine is necessary for the following rules and features.
#FollowSymLinks must be enabled for this to work.
<IfModule mod_rewrite.so>
Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine On
#Unless an explicit file or directory exists,
#redirect all request to Yii entry script.
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . index.php [L]
</IfModule>
Now, when I try to access commentfeed.xml through my browser without index.php (localhost/projectname/commentfeed.xml) I get a 404 error - Object not found!.
I've looked over the following guides & SO questions: URL Rewriting Guide, mod_rewrite documentation, and SO: Tips for debugging .htaccess rewrite rules but none of them had explicitly what I was looking for. Also, my apache error log is not reporting anything about the .htaccess file. Any help or guidance towards the correct usage would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

You need to tell the Yii UrlManager that the script name is not required. In your config/main.php file you should have:
'components'=>array(
...
'urlManager'=>array(
'urlFormat'=>'path',
'showScriptName'=>false,
'rules'=>array(
...
),
),
),
Make sure you also have a route defined to specify the controller/action that generates the commentfeed.xml file.
More info: http://www.yiiframework.com/doc/guide/1.1/en/topics.url#hiding-x-23x

Answer 2

The specific answer to my problem lay in using <IfModule> ... </IfModule>. With my setup of XAMPP v3.2.1 and the apache server installed with it, the only lines of code I needed in the .htaccess was simply:
RewriteEngine on
# if a directory or a file exists, use it directly
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
# otherwise forward it to index.php
RewriteRule . index.php