mod_rewrite, how does it work?

[saint_seiya]

Well i know what it does, i just want to know this:

Does it affect all the sites/folders in the server or just the files/folders you choose.

Example:

You need htaccess in the folder for it to work.

or

It affects all the files in the server after its installed.

[Xenon]

if you have it in the root directory it affects all files

it always affects all subdirectories AFAIK

[saint_seiya]

So its possible to put it in my site's root directory instead of the servers root directory? Because the owner of the server doesnt want the other sites to be affected.

[Xenon]

yes, put it in the sites root

[dstruct2k]

I get the feeling I should start a new thread for this....

Oh well, I'm asking anyways:

Why is mod_rewite not working on my Apache server? The server is almost a fresh install, so I was wondering if mod_rewite (and mod_mime too, if anyone knows where I can get this) are seperate files that have to be included into a folder of the Apache installation.... I checked the Apache site, I couldn't find too much info on the actual setup of these "mod_"s... Any help would be greatly appreciated.



PS - Newest release of Apache 1.3.x, relatively clean install, newest PHP and mySQL releases as well.