Rewrite condition with wildcard in query - regex

Question

I have a rewrite condition that rewrites /myPage.php?myQueryVar=foo-aRandomString to /myNewPage/foo-aRandomString. I only want this to apply in instances where there is a hyphen in the query value therefore I have some conditions in place as seen below:
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (^|&)myQueryVar=foo-(.*)($|&)
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ /myPage\.php\?myQueryVar=([^\s&]+) [NC]
RewriteRule ^myPage\.php$ /myNewPage/%1? [R=301,L]
I'd like to add another rule exception allowing /myPage.php?myQueryVar=bar-aRandomString. Currently I've had to simply cloine the above code and use it again but changing foo to bar as sen below. Is there a cleaner way of doing this without having to have multiple line of near identical code? Thank you.
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (^|&)myQueryVar=bar-(.*)($|&)
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ /myPage\.php\?myQueryVar=([^\s&]+) [NC]
RewriteRule ^myPage\.php$ /myNewPage/%1? [R=301,L]

Answer 1

Try to use this:
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (^|&)myQueryVar=(foo|bar)-(.*)($|&)
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ /myPage\.php\?myQueryVar=([^\s&]+) [NC]
RewriteRule ^myPage\.php$ /myNewPage/%1? [R=301,L]
(The first RewriteCond was changed)
Basically, foo was changed to this (foo|bar) which means:
( # begin of group
foo # a literal 'foo'
| # or
bar # a literal 'bar'
) # end of group
Bear in mind we had to enclose the two options within a group, since if not, the regex would have meant instead:
(^|&)myQueryVar=foo|bar-(.*)($|&) ==> (^|&)myQueryVar=foo OR bar-(.*)($|&)
Also, if you don't want to capture what is inside the parenthesis (that's why they are called 'capturing groups') You may use 'non-capturing groups' instead (?:). Using non-capturing groups is a good practice if you don't actually need to capture the inner data.
Also, you don't need the group holding the .* on the first RewriteCond, since you really use the capturing group of the second RewriteCond
So the rules could be changed like this:
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} (?:^|&)myQueryVar=(?:foo|bar)-.*(?:$|&)
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ /myPage\.php\?myQueryVar=([^\s&]+) [NC]
RewriteRule ^myPage\.php$ /myNewPage/%1? [R=301,L]
But even so, you could just one one single RewriteCond by joining the two regexes:
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^GET\ /myPage\.php\?myQueryVar=((?:foo|bar)-[^\s&]+) [NC]
RewriteRule ^myPage\.php$ /myNewPage/%1? [R=301,L]
(note that the (?:foo|bar)is a non-capturing group, since you don't need to capture just that part, you need to capture the variable as a whole