Looks like I encountered a problem after all. I installed Ultimate Seo Urls Version 2.5, everything seems to be fine for the english version of my site, however, when I switch to my chinese language site, choosing manufacturers from the manufacturers drop-down menu box in the left column caused problem. I am getting this :
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Forbidden
You don't have permission to access /oscommerce/catalog/±±¾©´ïÌØ¿µ¿Æ¼¼·¢Õ¹ÓÐÏÞÔðÈι«Ë¾-m-1.html on this server.
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although I am getting forbidden status response, the url clearly indicates that .htaccess is doing its job, it rewrites the url correctly, like this: http://127.0.0.1/oscommerce/catalog/xxxxx-...8a441673434ac16 , and if I refresh and reload the page, the page was shown as it should be.
I checked the log file, the error message in the log file is:
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Invalid argument: Cannot map GET /oscommerce/catalog/\xb1\xb1\xbe\xa9\xb4\xef\xcc\xd8\xbf\xb5\xbf\xc6\xbc\xbc\xb7\xa2\xd5\xb9\xd3\xd0\xcf\xde\xd4\xf0\xc8\xce\xb9\xab\xcb\xbe-m-1.html HTTP/1.1 to file
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if I switch back to English version, then the problem disappears.
.htaccess should be working, and it should not have anything to do with the multi-byte chinese language I am using for the site, since other SEO redirects are working fine, such as products_info page, etc.
I spent quite some time trying to figure this out, but apparently this was beyond my knowledge. it is very disappointing that I might have to give up this nicely done contribution just due to this annoying problem.
Any help or pointer will be greatly appreciated, thanks a lot...