Htaccess noob

[rich.owings]

Hi all,

I discovered that a site I'm working on has some pages from their old site that are stil live and getting traffic. I would like to add redirects for them to the .htaccess file.

Unfortunately, I have zero experience writing or editing .htaccess files. Here is the existing .htaccess file:

BEGIN WPSuperCache

END WPSuperCache

BEGIN WordPress

<ifmodule mod_rewrite.c="">RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]</ifmodule>

END WordPress

And here are a few sample lines that I need to add:

Redirect 301 /files/John-Doe.html /staff/
Redirect 301 /files/Jane-Smith.html /staff/
Redirect 301 /files/contact.html /contact/

So my question is, should I place those lines immediately after Rewrite engine on, or just before the closing IfModule tag or...?

There is no consistent pattern that would allow for a single rule or two. Oh, and I will backup the current .htaccess file first!

Many thanks for any help anyone can offer.

[Keszi]

I'm glad I could help! Let me know if you hit any walls with the implementation.

[rich.owings]

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply. I appreciate you sharing your insights.

[Keszi]

Hi there,

Usually my advice is to add any custom code after the default WordPress rules, just to keep it more organised. It is very important not to add the rules in the WP section (# BEGIN WordPress ->  # END WordPress).

Also I usually add comments before every rule group I create (just to have it more organised, and if anything goes wrong - check Search Console for anomalies after implementation - I know where I need to revert/adjust). You can add comments by starting the line with a # sign.

I hope it helps.

Oh and BTW, when using Redirect 301, you should use relative path for the OLD url and absolute path for the NEW url, so the lines that you provided need to contain the full URL for the new version:
Redirect 301 old-relative-path.html http://www.yourdomaingoeshere.com/newurl/