add_rewrite_rule issues

Question

i usually add rewrite rules for custom pages like this:

add_rewrite_rule('^deal-purchase?','index.php?is_purchase_page=1&post_type=page','top');

However on a site im working on now, the above just redirects to the home page whereas if i create a custom post type and reference that:

add_rewrite_rule('^deal-purchase?','index.php?is_purchase_page=1&post_type=market','top');

it works. Anyone any ideas what might be causing the 1st code to fail?

Answer 1

The second one works because post_type=market triggers the market post type archive.

Pages have no archive, so post_type=page in the first example doesn't point to a valid destination.

Rewrite rules have to ultimately result in a successful main query.

For a specific page, you could use page_id or pagename.