URL re-writing using htaccess problems - wordpress

Question

Just dipping my toes into the world of .htaccess URL rewriting for the first time, and fallen at the first hurdle. However am sure I'm missing something obvious...:)
My htaccess currently looks like this, which is a Wordpress install running from /wordpress but re-written to appear at the top level of the domain:
php_value short_open_tag 1
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
# add a trailing slash to /wp-admin
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?wp-admin$ $1wp-admin/ [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^ - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-(content|admin|includes).*) wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ wordpress/$2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]
</IfModule>
I want to add a rewrite rule to take anyone accessing:
/publication-details.php?id=xxx (where xxx is a number
to
/publications/pub-xxx/
I thought something like this would work:
RewriteRule ^publication-details.php?id=([0-9]+) /publications/pub-$1 [NC]
But I've tried that as a rule but it's not working - no matter where I order it in the existing rules. Trying to visit /publication-details.php just gets a 404 (Apache default). If I try /whatever (ie no extension in the URL) I get the Wordpress 404.
What am I missing?!
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Edit your Permalink to %postname%
add_filter( 'rewrite_rules_array','my_insert_rewrite_rules' );
add_action( 'wp_loaded','my_flush_rules' );
function my_insert_rewrite_rules( $rules )
{
$newrules = array();
$newrules['([^/]+)/publication/pub-([^/])/?$'] = add_rewrite_rule( '([^/]+)/publication/pub-([^/])?$', 'index.php?pagename=$matches[1]&pub-id=$matches[3]', 'top' );
return $newrules + $rules;
}
add_action( 'wp_loaded','my_flush_rules' );
// flush_rules() if our rules are not yet included
function my_flush_rules(){
$rules = get_option( 'rewrite_rules' );
if (! isset( $rules['([^/]+)/publication/pub-([^/])/?$'] )) {
global $wp_rewrite;
$wp_rewrite->flush_rules();
}
}

Answer 2

RewriteRule only works on the URI, not the Query String.
To do what you're trying to, you need a RewriteCond (=Condition) to check the Query String, e.g.
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} id=([0-9]+)
RewriteRule ^publication-details.php /publications/pub-%1? [R=302,L]
The RewriteCond is a condition for the following RewriteRule. Note that it's %1 in the Rule, not $1, to use a match from a Condition ($1 is only for matches in the Rule). I've added a single quotation mark at the end to disable the addition of the Query String, otherwise it would redirect to /publications/pub-12345?id=12345.