Eliminating the index segment in a URL (htaccess)

[eluser]tim042829[/eluser]
FYI: I am an experienced web developer (reference http://ellislab.com/forums/viewthread/162794/)
but I am new to PHP and codeIgniter.
I am working in a linux environment.

See: http://blog.insicdesigns.com/2009/02/bui...rk-part-1/

With the following .htaccess:

Code:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond $1 !^(index\.php|images|css|js|robots\.txt|favicon\.ico)
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ ./index.php/$1 [L,QSA]

I can request /documentroot/CodeIgniter/system/application/controllers/test.php as
http://localhost/CodeIgniter/index/test/
Is there a way to eliminate the '/index/' segment (path part) from
the URL above?

I'm a noob if not a boob when it comes to .htaccess.
TIA
Tim