I have lots of virtual hosts, and I want to put a single rewriting block at the top of the httpd.conf file that rewrites URLs no matter which virtual host the request might be directed to. How do I do this?
I found this, but my question is the same: how can I do this without resorting to .htaccess files and performing some other action for each virtual host?
Specify RewriteOptions InheritDown in the parent scope (such as httpd.conf) to get your rules applied in child Virtual Hosts without modifing them.
This will only work on Virtual Hosts where the RewriteEngine directive is set to on:
Note that rewrite configurations are not inherited by virtual hosts. This means that you need to have a RewriteEngine on directive for each virtual host in which you wish to use rewrite rules.
(source)
Apache supports this since 2.4.8 (not available at the time of the original question).
From documentation for RewriteOptions:
InheritDown
If this option is enabled, all child configurations will inherit the configuration of the current configuration. It is equivalent to specifying RewriteOptions Inherit in all child configurations. See the Inherit option for more details on how the parent-child relationships are handled. Available in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.8 and later.
InheritDownBefore
Like InheritDown above, but the rules from the current scope are applied before rules specified in any child's scope. Available in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.8 and later.
IgnoreInherit
This option forces the current and child configurations to ignore all rules that would be inherited from a parent specifying InheritDown or InheritDownBefore. Available in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.8 and later.
(http://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_rewrite.html#rewriteoptions)