Wiki like url? get variables from URL

[sdlyr8]

Hey, I've always wondered how its done. How does a page like www.domain.com/username know which user's profile to load? I know about GETs and POSTs, but how does one make a script like that? Basically the same deal with on wikipedia's site. Let me know if i'm not making any sense.. thanks!

[Alex]

If it just has http://domain.com/username besides using PHP to get the variable they're most likely using mod-rewrite to modify the URL. A normal url would look like http:/www.domain.com/somefile.php?variablename=value . Then in PHP to get that varaible you'd do:

 

$variable = $_GET['variablename'];

 

So in your example, www.domain.com/username, mod rewrite would be used and basically change the way the server sees that URL, most likely 'hiding' something like username=, allowing www.domain.com/?username=username to just be domain.com/username

[celsoendo]

Just to remember that mod_rewrite is not a php module.

 

It's an Apache module: http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/mod/mod_rewrite.html