How do I get my .htaccess file working?

Question

I own a website, let's call it medtalk.com. Now, I want my website to be only a forum. Currently I have vbulletin installed.

I installed vbulletin to the /forum directory. Now when I go to my website medtalk.com, it does not automatically go into my /forum directory and use index.php, instead if uses the default index.html in my base dir. I deleted that index.html in the base dir, and now it gives a 404 when I type in medtalk.com

What must I put in my .htaccess file for it to use /forum/index.php as the default page when someone types in medtalk.com?

I tried Rewrite Base /forum but that messed the site up and I get 500 internal server error now.

Would it just be better to move the entire contents of my /forum folder to the base folder, or will that break it too?

Answer 1

You did it correctly by putting the forum files in the root directory and getting rid of the "forum" folder.  Now you need to go back and edit the config files and whatever else they require for your forum to point to the correct path for your database.

Ron

Answer 2

As an alternative you can try to have a single line index.php in your base dir. The single line in that file would be:

<?php header('Location: http://www.medtalk.com/forum/'); ?>

This will forward all the default requests to your forum page. You can setup the forwarding (not rewriting) with .htaccess too, but I don't remember what would be the exact statement for that.