Lighttpd password protected folders

If you have followed these guides you should already have a Lihgttpd webserver with some funky things going on. In some cases you will want to password protect a directory. This is how it is done...

Edit /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

nano /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

Add "mod_auth" to server.modules section. It should look like...

server.modules = (
"mod_access",
"mod_fastcgi",
"mod_alias",
"mod_compress",
"mod_auth",

Then to the end of the lighttpd.conf add

$HTTP["url"] =~ "^/DIRECTORY_YOU_WANT_TO_PROTECT/" {
auth.debug = 2
auth.backend = "plain"
auth.backend.plain.userfile = "/home/PASSWORD_FILE.pass"
auth.require = ( "/DIRECTORY_YOU_WANT_TO_PROTECT/" =>
(
"method" => "basic",
"realm" => "Password protected area",
"require" => "user=aspedisca"
)
)

You should create a password file at the location you entered above. This file should include a line saying.

username:secretepassword

Change acording to your needs.You may add more than one user though. Make sure that the password file can be read by lighttpd.

chown lighttpd:lighttpd /home/PASSWORD_FILE.pass

Also change the part saying "/DIRECTORY_YOU_WANT_TO_PROTECT/". It should be relative to your www directory.
Finally, restart lighttpd server:

/etc/init.d/lighttpd restart

Test to reach your directory by using your beloved web browser and see if it works..