What are the potential pitfalls of using direct header redirection in PHP for URL mapping, as seen in the forum thread?

The potential pitfalls of using direct header redirection in PHP for URL mapping include the risk of header already sent errors, which can occur if there is any output before the header function is called. To solve this issue, you can use output buffering to capture any output before sending headers.

<?php
ob_start();
// Your code here
ob_end_clean();

// Redirect using header function
header("Location: new_page.php");
exit;
?>