how do I set up a secure page on my website?

[#1]

For checking purposes I had to copy the HTML home page source from the served page in my browser, and that went into KompoZer's source view OK. You have additional sources, the file on the server and the file in your FromPage directory as well as the page opened in the FrontPage editor.
You should be able to open the file directly from KompoZer using File->Open File and navigating in the Explorer window which opens to locate the file on your computer. That would avoid any need for an intermediary editor such as Notepad.
If you do need to open it in FrontPage it should be possible to copy the source code directly from that to the KompoZer source view.
The HTML code on Homepages does include lots of class and style references that might make sense for pages located on a FrontPages server, such as Plusnet used to provide, but are just ignored on Homepages. This is probably a mystery area for you, I don't think there's any need to worry about this for now.
As far as password protecting a folder is concerned, this works on my site - which doesn't have FrontPages interfering. So no reason for not being able to do this on your site - as long as having FrontPages running during file upload doesn't mess things up.
David

[#2]

Hi David, I've been a little busy lately & I'm now once again looking rebuilding with Kompozer. Just a thought, as you said that you have a secure page on your own site, why can't you write me a script to run the same as yours. The logon box that appears on PN when I view webstats is exactly what I need. Can't a script be written to enable this without me needing to rebuild?

[#3]

All I did to password protect a folder on my own site was follow the instructions in the library article How to password protect your website like you did. That process works for me but doesn't for you. Failure to work might be due to a mistake on your part, but having seen what Frontpage did when you uploaded the helloworld page using FileZilla I suspect not working resulted from side effects from Frontpage.
I'm not familiar with Frontpage options but if such side effects can be turned off by just using Frontpage as an editor and uploading files using FileZilla I'd be more confident that password protecting can be made to work. Is there an option to do that?
The newdir folder now gives a "403 access forbidden" error; have you changed the permissions on that folder?
David

[#4]

Hi David, I might have another try at following the instructions in the library article again as it's highly probable that I'd made a mistake.There were a couple of areas that I was unsure of & I'll seek your clarification on these in due course.
There isn't an option, that I can find, in Frontpage to password protect a page. I don't know how to turn off any side effects
It's quite possible that I've changed the permissions in the newdir folder as I was doing lots of experimenting. 
I would like to keep FP as there are lots of features that I like. It's pretty basic & easy to understand, which is great for me.
Best regards, Mick.

[#5]

You won't find an option in Frontpage, as the security is imposed by the web server not the pages themselves.
Also,  you can only protect an entire folder, not an individual page.
The key to getting password protection is the existence of the .htaccess and .htpasswd files with the right settings and permissions.  (As per the library article).
There should be no reason why you can't continue using FP,  as long as it doesn't interfere with these files in ways it shouldn't.

[#6]

Searching for Frontpage and password protection unfortunately suggests the two will not mix. Frontpage seems to be obsessed with maintaining its view of "the web" and interferes with attempts to change files independently.
Not entirely sure if this is correct but it looks like Frontpage might use .htaccess for its own purposes causing a user generated one to be overwritten.
David

[#7]

Microsoft uses active server pages in Frontpage but the ISP must use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption. Does PN use this?

[#8]

Regarding ASP, this is a fairly standard problem with Microsoft programs preferring their own solutions above any others, even to the point of making it unnecessarily hard to use alternatives. To use ASP requires using Microsoft IIS,  which Plunsnet do not do.
Therefore Plusnet do NOT offer ASP hosting.
SSL is an entirely different ballgame, unrelated to ASP or password protected pages,  it relates to the communication between the client and server,  which in the case of webpages is the difference between HTTP and HTTPS.
While there is some support for it , it imposes limitations.
[quote=https://portal.plus.net/support/hosting/webspace/webspace_faq.shtml#https]6. Can I use my webspace with HTTPS (SSL security)?
Yes, although you'll need to use a different address to view your site. The format of the secure address for your site is: https://homepages.plus.net/username/
Hosted domains and your regular virtual domains (www.username.plus.com,ccgi.username.plus.com etc) don't support SSL. You can learn more in our Guide to SSL Security.

[#9]

Hi Spraxyt, I've returned to trying to protect a folder in my website. I think that if the htaccess & htpasswd routine works for you & others, it must work for me. The only reason that itisn't working must be an error on my part.
I copied both the htaccess.txt & htpasswd.txt files individually onto notepad from the support pages & then saved both of them individually into my newdir folder on my website. Next was to open Filezilla & they are shown in my local site (left hand pane in the newdir folder, file size for htpasswd.txt is 25 & the filesize for htaccess.txt is 136. I dragged the individual files across into htdocs/newdir (righthand pane) & they were uploaded successfully.
I then renamed both files in the left hand pane to .htaccess & .htaccess, leaving the original files on my website as htaccess.txt & htpasswd.txt.
I then searched for www.paternosterlodge.co.uk/newdir/ hoping to bring up a password box only to get:
The website declined to show this webpage
HTTP 403
Question: when creating the htaccess.txt file using 'AuthUserFile/share/isp/plusnet/www/.................. should I have substituted the two letters following www/??/ with the first two letters of my user name (in this case su  ) or the first two letters of my website name, pa. Likewise after su/ or pa, should this be my account user name or my wesite name?
Best regards, Mick 


 



         

[#10]

Quote from: samgregkt

I copied both the htaccess.txt & htpasswd.txt files individually onto notepad from the support pages & then saved both of them individually into my newdir folder on my website. Next was to open Filezilla & they are shown in my local site (left hand pane in the newdir folder, file size for htpasswd.txt is 25 & the filesize for htaccess.txt is 136. I dragged the individual files across into htdocs/newdir (righthand pane) & they were uploaded successfully.

That seems OK. The filesize of htpasswd.txt probably didn't change on the remote site, htaccess.txt would be 3 (or perhaps 4) bytes smaller.

Quote from: samgregkt

I then renamed both files in the left hand pane to .htaccess & .htaccess, leaving the original files on my website as htaccess.txt & htpasswd.txt.

I hope you meant to say "right hand pane" there. The ones you should have renamed are those on the remote server.

Quote from: samgregkt

I then searched for www.paternosterlodge.co.uk/newdir/ hoping to bring up a password box only to get: The website declined to show this webpage HTTP 403

I don't think that is due to the change you've just made. I mentioned that problem in reply #32. You said you might have changed the permissions on the /newdir directory.. Those should be 755 and the files within it 644.

Quote from: samgregkt

Question: when creating the htaccess.txt file using 'AuthUserFile/share/isp/plusnet/www/.................. should I have substituted the two letters following www/??/ with the first two letters of my user name (in this case su  ) or the first two letters of my website name, pa. Likewise after su/ or pa, should this be my account user name or my wesite name?

There should be a space between AuthUserFile and /share/isp/.... However the two letters should be from your username (su) and / then your username follows (AuthUserFile /share/isp/plusnet/www/su/su..../htdocs/newdir/.htpasswd)
Hope this sorts things
David

[#11]

Hi David, I think that this is one of the area's where I went wrong - (I then renamed both files in the left hand pane to .htaccess & .htaccess, leaving the original files on my website as htaccess.txt & htpasswd.txt.)
I hope you meant to say "right hand pane" there. The ones you should have renamed are those on the remote server.
I've changed this now.
HTTP 403
I'm a bit unsure here. In Filezilla if I right click on the newdir folder on the bottom right hand pane (remote site), & left click file permissions the numeric value is 744. Should this read 644 & how do I check the 755 bit?
I'm glad that I created the htaccess part correctly.
Once again many thanks for your help.
Best regards
Mick

[#12]

All folders/directories need to have permissions 755 and files 644. The 403 error will be arising because the web server (Apache) can't search the directory.
To fix that, in the File Permissions display for the directory either tick the "execute" check boxes or type 755 in the text box and click OK. Note that the check boxes toggle between empty, tick and square if you repeatedly click on them. Square means 'don't change' and x will appear in the text box.
See attached example for how it should look.

[#13]

Hi David, good news & bad. I changed the permissions to 755 & 644 in Filezilla & then went on to my website. I have a hover button called 'members' that I've set to link to the newdir folder, clicked on & BINGO up popped the password box. Sadly when I entered the user name & password that I'd set when creating .htpasswd, I got a 500 internal server error message. I shut down the website & then went back in but now I can't get the password box to appear again. We're almost there & for a moment I thought that you'd cracked it. Ideas?
Best regards, Mick.

[#14]

So near and yet ...
I think the password information is saved for 24 minutes so if the directory is entered again within that time you won't be asked for the password again. This avoids visitor annoyance if they are browsing between the protected folder and elsewhere. The password box should reappear after not visiting the folder for that time.
The server 500 error could be due to a problem with the .htaccess file - has it's size changed since you originally uploaded it to the server?
David

[#15]

This might irrelevant in this instance, but another cause for server 500 errors is cgi with errors that cause the parser to fail.
Depending on how the systems configured, and if you can fond someone who can help on plusnets side,  usually the cause of the error is logged.