Kenn Nielsen

With some further adjustments, everything is now working.

I can now
a) Catch empty search strings and
b) View a specific page for empty searches and 404
all without .htaccess mod_rewrite.

The solution is to modify three files.

funtions.php:

// Added by Kenn Nielsen to catch empty searches
// https://wordpress.org/support/topic/htaccess-empty-search-query

function empty_search() {
   global $wp_query;
if( isset($_GET['s']) && $_GET['s']=='')
{
  $wp_query->set_404();
  status_header( 404 );
  get_template_part( 404 );
exit();
}
}

add_action('wp','empty_search');

404.php:

<?php
get_header();
if( isset($_GET['s']) && $_GET['s']==''){
?>

<!-- Empty Search Results -->
<div id="content">
etc....
<!-- Empty Search Results End Here -->

<?php
}else{
?>

<!-- Page Not Found  -->
<div id="content">
etc....
<!-- Page Not Found End here -->

<?php
}
get_footer();
?>

And to change the browser title accordingly to the content, modify header.php:
Add the following condition somewhere between the other title conditions, but before the last condition.

elseif ( is_404() ) {
	if( isset($_GET['s']) && $_GET['s']==''){
		echo __('Empty search | ', 'theme1741'); bloginfo( 'name' );
	}
	else
	{
		echo __('Error 404 | ', 'theme1741'); bloginfo( 'name' );
	}
}

Thanks,
Kenn Nielsen

Rajesh, I now have disabled the WP Super Cache and it seemed to conflict, and for that I’m sorry.

I now get the correct piece of 404.php, but that is for all pages I visit.

Now I have this code in 404.php

<?php
get_header();
if( $_GET['s'] ==''){
?>

and this in .htaccess:

# BEGIN WordPress

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php
</IfModule>

# END WordPress

Still does not work though.. 🙁

Are we not missing a condition in the .htaccess file for if( $_GET['s'] ==''){ to work?

Hi Rajesh,

I have now removed that part of the code and nothing is different from before. Have a try.

Okay thanks though ..

Line 371 is:
if (!wp_verify_nonce($_POST['br_meta_box_nonce'], basename(__FILE__))) {
🙂

The funny part is, that the standard wordpress login/register works just fine. It is only magic members register form the error won’t show.

So it can only be the plugin, right?