.htaccess: redirect if file doesn't exists - .htaccess

Question

It is quite popular question, but there is some distinction in my case that makes all more difficult.
Apache2 web server, Yii2 framework with prettyUrl turned on.
Here is initial .htaccess file, provided by Yii2:
RewriteEngine on
# if a directory or a file exists, use it directly
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
# otherwise forward it to index.php
RewriteRule . index.php
There is /docs web directory. And I would like to get files from it if they are exist and redirect to /docs-generator/create?file=<file_name> if the file doesn't exists.
So, I have added a rule:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/docs
RewriteRule ^docs/([\w-_.]+) http://kz_proj.test/docs-generator/create?file=$1 [L]
# if a directory or a file exists, use it directly
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
# otherwise forward it to index.php
RewriteRule . index.php
It's works but quite strange... First of all, I can't remove my test hostname from http://kz_proj.test/docs-generator/create?file=$1. It doesn't work without full name. The second one is about ^/docs and ^docs/([\w-_.]+) without the leading character. Why first part of these rules can't be the same in my case?
I guess something wrong with the rules...

Answer 1

You can use:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^docs/([\w-_.]+) /docs-generator/create?file=$1 [L,R=301]
# if a directory or a file exists, use it directly
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
# otherwise forward it to index.php
RewriteRule ^ index.php
It works with the domain name because it is necessarily a redirect in this case, but not without. I added [R=301] to force the redirection.
No need to add RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/docs
because the test is the same with RewriteRule ^docs
And why first part of these rules can't be the same in your case ?
REQUEST_URI always start with a /
and RewriteRule test path never start with a / in .htaccess (why????)