Protecting a directory using HTTP Auth on Dreamhost with cakePHP

One can protect the browsing of a special directory with a simple set of login/password by using appropriate .htaccess/.htpasswd files.

The classic way

Just create an .htaccess in the directory you want to protect with the following lines:

AuthName "Restricted Access"
AuthType Basic
AuthUserFile /full/path/to/your/.htpasswd
<Limit GET POST PUT>
Require valid-user
</Limit>

And to create the .htpasswd file, run the following command:

htpasswd -c /full/path/to/your/.htpasswd username

The -c modifier will create the file, omit it if you only want to add a new user. Also change the path to your .htpasswd file (moving it out of the webdir could be a good idea) and change username to any login you want.

You'll then be prompted to enter the password (twice) and your file will be generated.

cakePHP and Dreamhost fixed

I had an issue when protecting a folder in my app/webroot/ folder on Dreamhost. I'm not sure it is completly cake related nor Dreamhost related but the two together made it quite hard to debug.

Anyway, it appears that when issuing an HTTP Auth, Dreamhost redirect to a file named /failed_auth.html (this is the file you're supposed to see when your Auth fails, obviously).

But as I didn't have such a file in my app, everytime I tried to access my protected dir, I got my custom 404 error page.

To finally fix that, all I had to do was to create a real failed_auth.html page, or in my case, create a Route that redirect failed_auth.html to a custom failed auth page.

I guess just dropping a failed_auth.html file in app/webroot/ could have done the trick too.