Why I hate Joomla – Episode 1: URL suffix
Today I had really good fun with Joomla, that is, if you consider cursing and face-palming to be fun.
I have been using CMS systems since 2000 when I first installed php-Nuke. Shortly after that I used xoops to create a website for my clan, xoops is still one of my favorite CMS systems actually, even though WordPress is simply the best IMHO.
I did use Drupal, and actually liked when the developers split and Joomla was born. Now, I have started hating Joomla shortly after it was released. Main reason being their elitism in the forum, it seems that everyone has to comment but no-one actually comes up with genuine solutions. I would never even open their website again, had I no customers with Joomla websites, but since I do, I am on and off forced to deal with this piece of sunshine CMS.
So, now to the 2nd reason of probably 100+ to come:
I have just spend about 4 hours searching for a solution to get Joomla 1.5 to add a trailing slash (/) to the URL, instead of the default .html suffix. I found quite a lot of threads on the Joomla forum discussing how one could add a trailing slash instead of the .html suffix, and once again each thread was gang banged by Joomla Gurus making dumb a…smart comments, and a solution was nowhere to be found, unless you want to use a plugin. I swear, I would have slapped a few of them, were they near me when reading their useless comments… of course I can use a plugin like sh404 that completely hijacks your site and URL structure, but I was looking for the solution, not a work around!
So, after those 4 hours I finally got my Geany out of the bottle and did a few in-file searches, to find the files with the lines that does all the magic.
It is the router.php located in includes/router.php, open it and look for the function &build($url), and change the following within that function:
{
//Transform the route
$route = str_replace(‘index.php/', ", $route);
}
To this:
{
//Transform the route
$route = str_replace(‘index.php/', ", $route).'/';
}
Next, open libraries/joomla/document/html/renderer/head.php and look for this:
$strHtml .= $tab.'<base href="‘.$document->getBase().'" />'.$lnEnd;
}
change the above to this:
$strHtml .= $tab.'<base href="http://'.$_SERVER[‘SERVER_NAME'].'/" />'.$lnEnd;
}
You may have to modify this part a bit (maybe https, or if Joomla is installed in a sub folder, etc.), basically you should have your Homepage URL in the baseurl meta tag in the head section of the source code. 
That's it! It really is that simple 
which makes me even more furious 
… I mean appreciative… thinking about all the super smart comments I found in the Joomla forum. I was about to go back to the Joomla forum to post my solution and tell those "Joomla Gurus" how full of sunshine they are, but then I remembered that I got this blog.
Oh, you need to disable showing the URL suffix in the Global Configuration, of course!
Enjoy! 
p.s. Operating a blog is a fine form of anger management… 
2948
I wonder if anyone (except my client) is still using Joomla 1.5 and wants to have a trailing slash that replaces the .html suffix at all, else this post will serve the sole purpose of assisting me in venting some steam
If you are using another Joomla version and for some reason you cannot figure out how to add the slash to the end of SEF URLs, drop me a line with the Joomla Version, and I will have a look for you… it took me 5 min to figure it out in Joomla 1.5 (after trying to find the solution on the joomla forum and other websites for 4 hours), I am sure I can also help you with another version.
January 11, 2013 05:20
I wonder if someone (except my client) is still using Joomla 1.5 or wants to have a trailing slash that replaces the .html suffix at all, else this post will serve the sole purpose of assisting me in venting some steam