[TriLUG] permlinks or redirect management in Apache

[Jim Tuttle]

This is a common library problem.  I'm presently chairing a project team
to look at persistent identifier schemes and to document our needs.
Anyway, one of the ways that we've dealt with this is in the past for
lightweight uses is to use a php resolver script.  We give out a URL,
like http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/resolver/1840.2/105  The resolves to a
particular application in a particular location, along with thousands of
other IDs.  We can change that in one line in a look-up table.

In some cases we trim off the identifier, send it to a look-up table,
and return a URL.  In other cases, we pass the identifier on to an
application that does something with it.  It isn't terribly scalable,
but it limits our commitment to maintaining one script rather than an
entire website organization paradigm.  Anything beats hard-coded URLs.

Jim

Christopher L Merrill wrote:
> We have an increasing number of places in our product where we launch
> a browser for the user to give them information on our website, using
> URLs that are hard-coded into our app.
> 
> I'd like to future-proof this linkage between our code and the website
> structure - since things on the site tend to move around a bit.
> So far, I've considered these options:
> 1) redirects in httpd.conf
>    Works, but requires editing httpd.conf. I'd like to keep admins out of
>    the loop, but don't really want anyone (me included) touching httpd.conf
>    unless necessary. It also requires an apache restart...also something I
>    would like to avoid.
> 2) a permanent-link product that was suggested by a co-worker
> (codeignite?).
>    It is a bit heavy for our needs - using a database and all.
> 
> I'd guess there are many other solutions available - any suggestions?
> I'd prefer something that is easy (and safe) for non-admins to manage,
> but it doesn't need to be pretty.  Editing a text file on the server
> is fine.  Easy of installation and efficiency would also be high on my
> list.  We only have a few dozen of these links to manage, and I don't
> see it climbing above 100 in the next few years.
> 
> Thanks in advance!
> Chris
> 
> 


-- 
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Jim Tuttle
http://braggtown.com


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