/URL.org/user/$username | WTF?

[soltek]

Today I noticed something quite strange on youtube. This:

http://www.youtube.com/user/mcgloomy

 

Not the profile by itself, but the way the username can be added there to take us to the profile.

I mean, USER must be a folder, but I really doubt MCGLOOMY is another folder, even if it looks like it is.

I've read about using htaccess to hide the file name of a folder, but... How does this youtube thingy happens?

[KevinM1]

Neither user nor the username need to be a folder.  Most likely, YouTube is written using the MVC (Model View Controller) pattern.  'user' is the name of a controller, and 'username' is the argument passed into it's default action.

[Zurev]

The joys of mod rewrite.

 

http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/mod/mod_rewrite.html