How to Simplify .htaccess Rewriterule

Question

Is it possible to simplfy these RewriteRules? I've hundreds of similar entries in my .htaccess file and it seems not to be the best way to set a 410 Header.

RewriteRule ^pageID_9363511.html - [G]
RewriteRule ^pageID_9363511_2.html - [G]
RewriteRule ^ci_8819019/thumb_11725326.JPG - [G]
…
…

Thank you

Answer 1

You could use a rewrite map like this:

pageID_9363511.html -
pageID_9363511_2.html -
ci_8819019/thumb_11725326.JPG -

Then you lookup the requested URI path like this:

RewriteCond ${gone:$0} =-
RewriteRule .+ - [G]

The only simplification is that you don’t need the repetitive RewriteRule and [G]. And with a rewrite map of the type dbm you could even have an access time of O(1) instead of O(n).