Here is the .htaccess file from the e107 cms that I mentioned above.
Maybe it would help understand what could be going wrong, and perhaps someone
could look at creating a url toolkit from the content, and explain what other hiawatha
conf settings need altered to have a similar effect as those in the apache .htaccess file below.
# Custom error pages for php scripts only
<FilesMatch \.php$>
	ErrorDocument 400 /error.php?400
	ErrorDocument 401 /error.php?401
	ErrorDocument 403 /error.php?403
	ErrorDocument 404 /error.php?404
	ErrorDocument 500 /error.php?500
</FilesMatch>
### Performance
### AddDefaultCharset utf-8
### Security
	ServerSignature Off
# secure htaccess file
<Files .htaccess>
	order allow,deny
	deny from all
</Files>
# protect e107_config.php
<Files e107_config.php>
	order allow,deny
	deny from all
</Files>
### Block Bad Bots
	SetEnvIfNoCase ^User-Agent$ .*(craftbot|download|extract|stripper|sucker|ninja|clshttp|webspider|leacher|collector|grabber|webpictures) HTTP_SAFE_BADBOT
	SetEnvIfNoCase ^User-Agent$ .*(libwww-perl|aesop_com_spiderman) HTTP_SAFE_BADBOT
	Deny from env=HTTP_SAFE_BADBOT
### Disable directory listing
	Options -Indexes
### limit file uploads to 10mb
### LimitRequestBody 10240000
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    <IfModule mod_env.c>
        SetEnv HTTP_MOD_REWRITE On
        SetEnv HTTP_MOD_REWRITE_MEDIA On
    </IfModule>
### enable rewrites
###	Options +FollowSymLinks 
	RewriteEngine On
### Set this to your e107 site root, path relative to web root
### Uncomment it in case your server isn't able to rewrite proper 
	#RewriteBase /
	
### Allow only GET and POST methods
	RewriteCond %{REQUEST_METHOD} ^(TRACE|TRACK|OPTIONS|HEAD)
	RewriteRule .* - [F]
### Rewrite for Image URLs
    ReWriteRule ^media\/img\/(a)?([\d]*)x(a)?([\d]*)\/(.*)?$ thumb.php?src=e_MEDIA_IMAGE/$5&$1w=$2&$3h=$4 [NC,L]
    ReWriteRule ^media\/avatar\/(a)?([\d]*)x(a)?([\d]*)\/(.*)?$ thumb.php?src=e_AVATAR/$5&$1w=$2&$3h=$4 [NC,L]
    RewriteRule ^media\/img\/([-A-Za-z0-9+/]*={0,3})\.(jpg|gif|png)?$ thumb.php?id=$1 [NC,L]
    ReWriteRule ^theme\/img\/(a)?([\d]*)x(a)?([\d]*)\/(.*)?$ thumb.php?src=e_THEME/$5&$1w=$2&$3h=$4 [NC,L]
### send 404 on missing files in these folders 
	RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(e107_images|e107_files)/ 
### don't rewrite for existing files, directories and links
	RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
	RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
	RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-l 
	
### Single entry point ###
	RewriteRule .* index.php [L]
</IfModule>
### Mod_Expires Settings (when available)
### May be modified if required
    <IfModule mod_expires.c>
        ExpiresActive On
        ExpiresDefault "access plus 2 hours"
        ExpiresByType image/x-icon "access plus 1 year"
        ExpiresByType image/gif "access plus 1 week"
        ExpiresByType image/png "access plus 1 week"
        ExpiresByType image/jpg "access plus 1 week"
        ExpiresByType image/jpeg "access plus 1 week"
        ExpiresByType text/css "access plus 1 month"
        ExpiresByType application/javascript "access plus 1 month"
        ExpiresByType text/javascript "access plus 1 month"
        ExpiresByType text/x-javascript "access plus 1 month"
    </IfModule>
### Gzip Compression Module
<ifmodule mod_deflate.c>
    AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/text text/html text/plain text/xml text/css text/javascript application/x-javascript application/javascript application/xml text/xml application/rss+xml
</ifmodule>
### Enable when developing locally. 
### SetEnv E_DEV true
Thanks, john