login to password protected directories

[red_bull_NRG]

Hello everyone,

I have a question. How could I create a php script that when a user logs in, it will log them into a password protected directory and let them view the files. I want to use this as a upload kind of thing, so the user can upload files and delete files, but they're all on the user's personal directory that is password protected. Please help me with this :) Thanks in advance!

[kows]

it might be simpler to use an htaccess file (or its equivalent) to password protect anything effectively, and then use php and a database to keep track of and manage their files. you could look into how to do that with htaccess here (http://www.apluskb.com/scripts/search_kb.pl?catid=1&showquestion=2161).

[red_bull_NRG]

okay, I now know how to create the .htaccess file, but how could i have a php script that will create a directory, and write the username and password in .htpasswd file and set the path in the .htaccess file. Thanks for the help!

[kows]

you can use the crypt() function to create password hashes for use in the htpasswd file:
<?php
// Set the password
$password = 'mypassword';

// Get the hash, letting the salt be automatically generated
$hash = crypt($password);
?>

the mkdir() function for making a directory:
<?php
mkdir("/path/to/my/dir", 0700);
?>

and the fopen/fwrite functions to append a file:
<?php
$filename = '.htpasswd';
$somecontent = "$username:$password_hash\n";

// Let's make sure the file exists and is writable first.
if (is_writable($filename)) {

// In our example we're opening $filename in append mode.
// The file pointer is at the bottom of the file hence
// that's where $somecontent will go when we fwrite() it.
if (!$handle = fopen($filename, 'a')) {
echo "Cannot open file ($filename)";
exit;
}

// Write $somecontent to our opened file.
if (fwrite($handle, $somecontent) === FALSE) {
echo "Cannot write to file ($filename)";
exit;
}

echo "Success, wrote ($somecontent) to file ($filename)";

fclose($handle);

} else {
echo "The file $filename is not writable";
}
?>
all the examples are from php.net, though the last is changed slightly to reflect the format that an htpasswd file would have.

[red_bull_NRG]

Here's some code that I was experimenting around with. For some reason, it won't work. Can someone please help me out?

<?php
$password = password;
$hash = crypt($password);
function click_crypt() {
print $hash;
}
?>
<input type="text" name="password">
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="Crypt" onclick="click_crypt()">

And remember, I am completely new to php, so this is a pretty basic question :)

[kows]

um.. because that's not how PHP works. PHP is not like javascript -- it cannot manipulate a page that has already been submitted to a browser. its syntax is similar because they're both based off of C (which is what may have confused you?). you would need to post that form to another script. an example follows:

this is your form (form.html?):
<form action="crypt.php" method="post">
<input type="text" name="password" />
<input type="submit" value="Encrypt" />
</form>

this is your script (crypt.php):
<?php
if($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'] == "POST"){
$password = crypt($_POST['password']);
echo $password . " is your encrypted password.";
}
?>
you can also combine this form and the crypt.php code into the same script if you'd like (but make sure you are still pointing the <form> to the name of the script, in this case -- crypt.php).