pretty links?

[Palamedes]

Is there currently a way (or a planned way in the future) to do customizable perma/pretty links using mod rewrite?

So I can have mystore.com/index.php?rt=index/home look like mystore.om/home?

Maybe something similar to what wordpress allows you to do?  (I hate comparing you to wordpress.. )

WordPress offers you the ability to create a custom URL structure for your permalinks and archives. This can improve the aesthetics, usability, and forward-compatibility of your links. A number of tags are available;  codex.wordpress.org/Using_Permalinks

[abantecart]

I think you refer to SEO URLs

It is already available in AbanteCart.
In the product, category and manufacturer (brand) edit section there is a SEO Keyword that needs to be set.

You need to have .htaccess enabled as well for this to work.

[Palamedes]

Is there an example .htaccess file somewhere?

[Palamedes]

The config area says it comes with a htaccess.txt file but I'm not seeing that anywhere.

[abantecart]

This file .htaccess.txt is located in directory public_html on original distribution archive.

[Jay]

Worth noting that any files starting with a . are considered hidden, which could be why you can't see it. Here's what it should contain

# 1.To use URL Alias you need to be running apache with mod_rewrite enabled. 

# 2. In your abantecart directory rename htaccess.txt to .htaccess.

# For any support issues please visit: http://forum.abantecart.com

Options +FollowSymlinks

# Prevent Directoy listing 
Options -Indexes

# Prevent Direct Access to files
<FilesMatch "\.tpl">
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
</FilesMatch>

# SEO URL Settings
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)\?*$ index.php?_route_=$1 [L,QSA]

(had to put in php tags sorry as code tags aren't working)