I am investigating Rewrite Rule of Apache and not using .htaccess but virtual host setting for writing them.

Here I have 2 questions:

1. I can use "RewriteRule blog\_rss.xml blog\_rss.php" but cannot use "RewriteRule ^blog\_rss.xml$ blog\_rss.php", why?
2. Even the first script is working, it doesn't change to the RSS style what I want. Should I set handler for it with Rewrite Rule?

Thanks for answering this question.

Update: Here is the scripts about rewrite rule.

```
<Directory />
 <IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
  RewriteEngine On
  ErrorDocument 404 /error/404.php
  RewriteRule ^blog_rss\.xml$ blog_rss.php
 </IfModule>
</Directory>

```