.htaccess with .htpasswd on site root causes redirect loop

.htaccessauthenticationhtpasswdredirect

I want to temporarily password-protect a site.

I have an .htaccess file in the site root containing:

AuthType Basic
AuthName "Example Site Name"
AuthUserFile /home/my_username/.htpasswd
Require valid-user

This throws up a login window when I access example.com, however, when I authenticate I get a 310 error:

This webpage has a redirect loop

The webpage at http://example.com/ has resulted in too
many redirects. Clearing your cookies for this site or allowing
third-party cookies may fix the problem. If not, it is possibly a
server configuration issue and not a problem with your computer.

Error 310 (net::ERR_TOO_MANY_REDIRECTS): There were too many
redirects.

Now, hitting example.com gives me this error every time without asking me to authenticate.

Why is this happening?

Best Answer

In your httpd config you probably haven't got any error documents defined, so it is trying to return you to the base page, which throws an error, rinse, repeat.

try adding:

ErrorDocument 401 /[path_to_file]/error.html
ErrorDocument 403 /[path_to_file]/error.html

to your .htaccess file. Of course, make sure those simple error.html files exist too.

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