End Rewrite process by L-Flag?

[Standart]

Hi,

 

I'm pretty new to RewriteRules. Here's my scenario:

 

In a .htaccess file I want to redirect (301) url path "old" to url path "new". Like this:

 

RewriteRule ^old$ /new [R=permanent]

 

Additionally I want to rewrite url path "new" to the existing file "old" (no external redirect):

 

RewriteRule ^new$ old

 

These two rules work perfectly unless I try to use them both. I tried to use the L-flag which stops the rewrite process according to the apache docs:

 

RewriteRule ^new$ old [L]
RewriteRule ^old$ /new [L,R=permanent]

 

Now if I request http://mydomain.net/old or http://mydomain.net/new I get a 301 to the location http://mydomain.net/new and in an infinite loop. I understand that but as I understood the L-flag I could stop this loop being the last rewrite statement to be processed. I assumed that the redirect rule would initiate a new request to "new" and that request would be rewritten to "old" without invoking the redirect again.

 

Of course I could rename my original file but I'm interested in how the L-flag really works. Anyone an explanation?