Secure PHP Files with HTTP Authentication
It is quite common these days to have the uttermost need to have password protected single and bunch of files in order to prevent illegal and unauthentic access to those files. There are several ways through which this can be done including cookies, sessions, HTTP authentication and JavaScript. In this post, the more concentration has been given to HTTP authentication. This form of authentication is also known as Apache HTTP authentication as this form is used and accessible for Apache based web server. It could be accessible even with Microsoft’s IIS web server but more difficult and critical to deploy thus demands many configuration changes in order to run it successfully.
Apache Web Server
Apache is a web server also known as a program that is running PHP, accepts incoming requests for web based pages and sends out the correct and authentic data. It is very easy to find out whether you are running Apache or not by simply making use of phpinfo() function. Might be you are not even aware of what HTTP authentication is but it is most likely that you may have access it often times. In many PHP scripts, it is widely used as login interfaces to the administration areas along with many popular websites.
Protecting Single and Multiple Files
Start off with adding protected passwords to a single file and then edit it to add to multiple files. The manner in which HTTP authentication works is by making use of HTTP headers in which the web server and browser both can work cordially and understand. By making use of the apt headers, a page can be created that will ask for the customer to login. If the entered information is right, a web page will appear otherwise comes up with an error message. For securing multiple files, you need to secure more than just one page. What would you do then if you move all the code into mentioned file including files on any of the pages that you want to password protect? It would become tiresome especially if you are including several files. One good alternative is to convert it into a function, add it into a function library file and make it re-usable.
In general, there are two major methods through which you can provide multiple users’ password protected access to your website. The foremost one is by providing username and password files and the other one is by providing username and password tables in a database. Most of the people in this tech savvy world use databases, so more focus is on the latter method. In order to successfully implement a file based version of the script, you have to save usernames and passwords to a file specifically mentioned on each line. Then, you have to read each line and check if the username and password matches or not. Databases are useful and many websites have their own dynamic content management systems for their websites that let several users and authors to access that arena. As the author data would be already stored in the database so there is no need to add more data or any other file. Web Outsourcing Team is one of the preeminent web design and development company, catering excellent services in PHP, CMS, SEO and more from many extensive years. Feel free to even contact the firm at mail@ravinderkhurana.com. I wish, this post will help you understand more about password protecting your site by using such a simple and effective method. You must try out the same or think of deploying the file based version. Stay tune for more information on the same.
