How to protect web directories using .htaccess

To protect web directories with password using .htaccess File

This article helps you to protect other search engines from accessing information of site when it’ s in the development phase.

To set password for Directories

---------------- On RedHat/CentOS based systems ----------------
vi /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

---------------- On Debian/Ubuntu based systems ----------------
nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/000-default.conf

To find root of Apache Document directory

On Apache 2.2 Version

Options Indexes Includes FollowSymLinks MultiViews

AllowOverride All
allow,deny
Allow from all

On Apache 2.4 Version

Options Indexes Includes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
AllowOverride All
Require all granted

To save file and restart

--------------- On Systemd -------------------

systemctl restart httpd [On RedHat based systems]
systemctl restart apache2 [On Debian based systems]

--------------- On SysV init -----------------
service httpd restart [On RedHat based systems]
service apache2 restart [On Debian based systems]

To generate user name and password

Syntax
htpasswd -c filename username

-c option helps to keep encrypted username and password

To create a new directory

mkdir /home/linuxhelp

To generate username and password
htpasswd -c /home/linuxhelp/test-file linuxhelp

To change ownership of file

---------- On RedHat/CentOS based systems ----------------

chown apache: /home/linuxhelp/test-file
chmod 640 /home/linuxhelp/test-file

----------- On Debian/Ubuntu based systems ----------------
chown www-data /home/linuxhelp/test-file
chmod 640 /home/linuxhelp/test-file

To request password to access targeted directory

vi /var/www/html/.htaccess
AuthType Basic
AuthName " Restricted Access" 
AuthUserFile /home/linuxhelp/test-file
Require user linuxhelp

To save file and setup

http://ip-address