UBB.Developers Forums Community Development Programming Web Hosting Password Protect one file

I usually use an .htaccess file like this to password protect directories.

[]
AuthUserFile /home/blah/blah/lunch/blah/.htpasswd
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName "phpProtection"
AuthType Basic

<Limit GET POST>
require valid-user
</Limit>[/]

Can you use .htaccess to password protect only a single file? Or does it always have to be a whole directory?

AFAIK - it a directory level thing only - I suppose you could put that file in a unique directory and then in htaccess redirect anyone viewing that file, to the one in the unique directory - that way the one file would be passworded, simply because the entire directory is.

Havn't tried it, but that ought to work.

Ian is correct, I don't think you can password protect an individual file, at least not with .htaccess I don't think. The only real restrictions you can put on files by default is by CHMOD, but when restricting a file that way, you will either allow or dissalow permission, there is no password prompt.

If someone knows of a way to do this, it would be good to know. But I think CHMOD will restrict files too much, and .htaccess will only work on a directory level.

Sure, why not.

Stick this in your httpd.conf in your virtual host container. It will probably work with an .htaccess too.

<Files /path/to/myfile.php>
AuthUserFile /home/blah/blah/lunch/blah/.htpasswd
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName "phpProtection"
AuthType Basic

<Limit GET POST>
require valid-user
</Limit>
</Files>

What I can't remember is ... is it <Files or <File

Navaho - once again - you are my hero.

It is "files" and did work in .htaccess

The only difference was that since I was putting the .htaccess file in the directory that the file was in - I didn't need the whole path in the first line - just the filename.

Then it worked like a charm.

Thank you!!!!!!

Might want to move this to Design Matters - as it is a very useful tip Thanks Navaho.

Of course Jeremy & I knew this - but want to test Navaho's knowledge...... I wish!!

haha.. yeah, really I was just testing rick's skills But no.. I had no idea you could do that, so I have added it to my list of useful information

very interesting...but I have a "little" question.
What do I have to write in .htaccess file?
Regards from Spain.
Details:
I use windows millenium and I have to protect ONLY one file called admin.php located in folder SITIO56.
In SITIO56 there are more files, but I only want to protect admin.php.