FAQ: How to protect your web pages by Page Authentication?

Let's suppose you want to protect web pages in your UNIX directory called project to username UserA and password secret. To do that, you need to create 2 files (.htaccess and .htpasswd), and put them in your UNIX directory project.

1. Create a text file called .htaccess in directory project that looks like this:

   AuthUserFile /home/<login-name>/public_html/<DirectoryName>/.htpasswd
   AuthGroupFile /dev/null
   AuthName Page Authentication
   AuthType Basic
   
   
   require valid-user
   

   Remark: <login-name> = Your UNIX Username
   <DirectoryName> = project

2. In project directory, create the password file .htpasswd using the following UNIX command:In order to do this, you need to use SSH client to connect the UNIX server.
   

   htpasswd -c .htpasswd <UserName>

   Remark: <UserName> = UserA

   Then, type in the password secret twice as instructed.

   N.B. It is assumed that .htpasswd does not exist. If you have created one and want to add a second user to .htpasswd file, please try the following command:

   htpasswd .htpasswd <UserName2>

   Remark: <UserName2> = UserB

   Then, type in another password secret2 twice as instructed.

3. Now, try to access a web page in directory project -- your browser should demand a username and password, and not give you access to the file unless you enter UserA and secret or enter UserB and secret2 for the username and password respectively.

Note: If you are using a browser that doesn't handle authentication, you will not be able to access the document at all.

Remarks:

• Users should have the basic knowlege of UNIX operating system such as UNIX commands, file structure and security control for the above operations.
• Users can refer to the UNIX Command Quick Reference for basic UNIX command.

You can use either following SSH client to connect to the server moon.eduhk.hk

PuTTY is available in all OCIO provided PC. You can invoke PuTTY via WinSCP by clicking Start -> Programs -> WinSCP. Connect to the server then click Commands -> Open in PuTTY from the menu bar.