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Password Protecting A Web Page Using A Personal Password Database

Note: The encryption algorithm used for the password is not as secure as some encryption algorithms. We are working on providing a more secure way for you to password-protect web pages.

To password protect a web page, it must be located in a password- protected directory. To create a password-protected directory, use the following steps:

1. Change into your pub directory:

   cd ~/../pub

2. Create a directory in which to store the password file:

   mkdir passwords

3. Make the passwords directory so that nobody can read it:

   fs setacl passwords system:anyuser none system:httpd read

4. Create the password file with the username and password you'd like people to use to access your password-protected web page. You can establish more than one username and password in this step; just repeat the command for each username.

   dbmanage ./passwords/password_file adduser username

   (Replace username with the username you'd like people to type to access the page.)

5. You'll be asked for a password. Type the password, press return, and then type the password again. This will be the password used to access the web page.
6. Create a directory for your password protected web page.

   mkdir private
   
   (You can use whatever directory name you like; we have used the name private)

7. Change the AFS permissions on the directory that you created with the commands:

   fs sa private/ system:anyuser none system:httpd read

   
   This will give the web server read permissions and remove the world read permissions that your pub directory has by default.
8. Change into the directory you just created.

   cd private

9. Create a text file called .htaccess containing the following.

   pico .htaccess

   to begin creating the file):

   AuthType Basic
AuthName ByPassword
AuthDBUserFile
/users/yourusername/pub/passwords/password_file
<Limit GET>
require user username
</Limit>

   (Replace yourusername with your own WAM login ID. Replace username with the username you want people to type to access the page, the same username you chose in step 3. If you used pico to create the file, save it using control-O, press return, and then use control-X to exit. If you created more than one username in step 3, you can allow multiple users access by putting additional require user username lines in the .htaccess file, one for each username.)

That's it! Now, just put the web page you'd like to protect into the private directory. To access the page, point your web browser to:

http://www.wam.umd.edu/~yourusername/private/filename.html

(Where filename.html is the name of your password-protected web page, and yourusername is your WAM login ID.)

You should see a small window pop up, asking you for the username and password. Type in the username and password, and you'll be able to access the web page.