Is there a way to redirect bad requests to a 404 page?

[healthbasics]

http://mysite.com/[garbage]

http://mysite.com/[garbage].html

http://mysite.com/[garbage]/[garbage]

 

All redirect to my 404 page no problem.  I did this with an .htaccess redirect. 

 

However, requests like http://mysite.com/index.php?page=[garbage] produces a completely blank page.  Is there anyway i can redirect to something when the page doesn't exist?

[Mchl]

header

[healthbasics]

I read that and I see that you can use this function for this but where exactly would put what exact code to redirect to .\php\not_found.php for example?

 

I am not really all that experienced with this, sorry.

[Mchl]

I assume, that on your application you check if $_GET['page'] variable is something meaningful (e.g. there's some content related to it in database), or it's just garbage. If it's garbage, use header() to redirect.

 

Example with MySQL:

<?php
$page = mysql_real_escape_string($_GET['page']);  //make sure nothing harmful get's injected into query
$sql = "SELECT ... FROM pages WHERE page = '$page'";
$result = mysql_query($sql);
if(mysql_num_rows($result) == 0) { //check if any rows got returned
  //redirect to 404
} else {
  //display data
}

[TOA]

I read that and I see that you can use this function for this but where exactly would put what exact code to redirect to .\php\not_found.php for example?

 

I am not really all that experienced with this, sorry.

 

php.net/manual/en/function.header.php

 

So it would be

header("location: .\php\not_found.php");

 

You can also do a timed redirect like this

header("refresh:5; url='.\php\not_found.php'");

[healthbasics]

I assume, that on your application you check if $_GET['page'] variable is something meaningful (e.g. there's some content related to it in database), or it's just garbage. If it's garbage, use header() to redirect.

 

Example with MySQL:

<?php
$page = mysql_real_escape_string($_GET['page']);  //make sure nothing harmful get's injected into query
$sql = "SELECT ... FROM pages WHERE page = '$page'";
$result = mysql_query($sql);
if(mysql_num_rows($result) == 0) { //check if any rows got returned
  //redirect to 404
} else {
  //display data
}

 

I don't have my sql and there is no implementation for checking or anything in place.  That's what I'm trying to do now.  I was trying to prevent people that send a bad request (for example if the site changes and there are latent search engine links) from simply getting a completely blank white page.

 

Is there an easy way to do this?

 

@DevilsAdvocate - I read that but it doesn't really make clear to me what I have to put where to accomplish what I'm trying to do.

[TOA]

I assume, that on your application you check if $_GET['page'] variable is something meaningful (e.g. there's some content related to it in database), or it's just garbage. If it's garbage, use header() to redirect.

 

Example with MySQL:

<?php
$page = mysql_real_escape_string($_GET['page']);  //make sure nothing harmful get's injected into query
$sql = "SELECT ... FROM pages WHERE page = '$page'";
$result = mysql_query($sql);
if(mysql_num_rows($result) == 0) { //check if any rows got returned
  //redirect to 404
} else {
  //display data
}

 

I don't have my sql and there is no implementation for checking or anything in place.  That's what I'm trying to do now.  I was trying to prevent people that send a bad request (for example if the site changes and there are latent search engine links) from simply getting a completely blank white page.

 

Is there an easy way to do this?

 

@DevilsAdvocate - I read that but it doesn't really make clear to me what I have to put where to accomplish what I'm trying to do.

 

Replace where it says "// redirect to 404" in the code Mchl posted with the header call

[Mchl]

I was trying to prevent people that send a bad request (for example if the site changes and there are latent search engine links) from simply getting a completely blank white page.

 

Is there an easy way to do this

 

The question is: how do you recognise a bad request? What does your page variable stand for?

[healthbasics]

?page=[good name] loads .\php\[good name].php

 

I am not real picky about the exact mechanics of how to do this or what is displayed so long as it's SOMETHING.  I just felt like it should be something more than a totally blank white page incase somebody links in with a malformed link. 

 

Automatic redirection to the root home page would be fine.  Redirection to my 404 page would be fine too, really anything besides just a plain blank page.

 

If this is a huge deal or requires my sql implementation to do it I'll definitely put this on the back burner but I thought there might be a quick fix. 

[TOA]

?page=[good name] loads .\php\[good name].php

 

I am not real picky about the exact mechanics of how to do this or what is displayed so long as it's SOMETHING.  I just felt like it should be something more than a totally blank white page incase somebody links in with a malformed link. 

 

Automatic redirection to the root home page would be fine.  Redirection to my 404 page would be fine too, really anything besides just a plain blank page.

 

If this is a huge deal or requires my sql implementation to do it I'll definitely put this on the back burner but I thought there might be a quick fix.

 

Well, the header is the way to go. How you decide to test the condition I'm not sure.

For ex.

if (condition == failure) {
header();
} else {
display
}

 

Hope that helps

[healthbasics]

 

Well, the header is the way to go. How you decide to test the condition I'm not sure.

For ex.

if (condition == failure) {
header();
} else {
display
}

 

Hope that helps

 

It does.  Anybody know how to test? 

[Mchl]

file_exists

[healthbasics]

This sounds good but where to put it?

 

if (condition == failure) {
header();
} else {
display
}

 

Taking a stab...  can I just do:

if (file_exists($html_path.$file)) {
include $html_path.$file;
} else {

include $html_path.404;
}

(Note: I created a file 404.php for this exercise)

 

Where do I place this code?  Just in index.php?

[Mchl]

Where do I place this code?  Just in index.php?

 

Yes. Or maybe no. I'm not sure. I didn't see your code

[healthbasics]

My index.php is:

 

<?php 

include "menu.inc.php";

function menu($_menu){
$str = '';
foreach($_menu as $url => $name){
	$sel = ($_GET['page'] == $url ) ? ' id="selected" ' : '';
	$str .= "<li ". $sel ."><a class='five' href=" . $url . " >" . $name . "</a></li>";
}
echo $str;
}

$page = ( isset($_GET['pg']) ?  $_GET['pg'] : ((isset($_GET['page']))? $_GET['page']:'home'));

$file = basename($page).'.php';
$html_path = "php/";

if (file_exists($html_path.$file)) include $html_path.$file;
?>

 

ANd my first guess was wildly wrong - doing that creates a nice blank white page for *everything*!

[Mchl]

You already have some code in place See:

 

if (file_exists($html_path.$file)) include $html_path.$file;

 

Now change it to:

 

if (file_exists($html_path.$file)) {
  include($html_path.$file);
} else {
  include('404.html'); //or whatever - just make sure the file IS actually there.
}

 

If you still see blank page, there might be something wring with your paths. You might want to use require instead of include(), which will tell you if it can find the file or not

[healthbasics]

works beautifully.  Thanks so much!!!