Can I create a shared "guest account" for multiple users?

[StefanKW]

Hi there,

All the content on our website has been public so far, which means there was no need to use ACL at all.

But now we'd like to set up one page that should be password protected. However, we want to do that, by having one shared password/username (or even only a password) for all those users who'd like to access this page. I looked into the ACL feature, but it seems to be unnecessarily complex for this case.

What is the easiest way to realize that? Is there maybe a plugin I could use?

I would be happy to get some ideas.

Thanks a lot!
Stefan

[Websites4SmlBus]

I think this could be easily implemented using an .htaccess file. I normally use it to protect directories like, for instance, the administration directory.

I have not tested this link but it seems to exactly describe what you are trying to accomplish.
http://support.hostgator.com/articles/c ... t-one-file

[StefanKW]

Yes, I thought about that as well. The question is, if Joomla supports that? Because as far as I know Joomla isn't quite structured in a way, that I can just put in a .htaccess file within a joomla directory so that only this one page is secured...

[Websites4SmlBus]

I think I see what you mean. The example in the link is for a single file
<FilesMatch "examplefile.extension">
However Joomla! calls a single php file and references articles using a ?query, for instance this page is:
http://forum.joomla.org/posting.php?mod ... 3&t=867202

Joomla! can also be configured in a more SEO friendly way so that it's referenced like this: index.php/alias.html

In this example alias.html does not really exist as a separate physical file so I'm not really sure how .htaccess we see it. You could test it easily enough.

Another option that may or may meet your needs is to create an actual html page and access it through Joomla! using a wrapper. That should work from an .htaccess perspective.

If these options don' t work I would be inclined to look in JED under Access & Security. I know it's a big category but there are several subcategories that, by their names, suggest there may be a solution for your problem.
http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/advanced-search

[StefanKW]

Hey there,

Thank you for your answer.

What I'd like to test for now is, using the Login module that Joomla has. The user will be redirected to the page in question, once he logged in. Technically it works very easily, though my question therefore is:

Is it possible that multiple users use the same credentials to login through this module? And if so, if someone else logs in at the same time from another computer, will the original user be logged out? Respectively, if several users are logged in with this account, what happens if one of them logs out?

I tried to find answers to those questions, but I don't seem to find any regarding Joomla 2.5... Because if the above scenarios are all possible, then this would be a perfect solution.

Thanks,
Stefan

[Websites4SmlBus]

Multiple users (computers) can login to the same joomla account and they will all remain logged in, the problem will occur when one of them logs out of the account, from Joomla's perspective the account is now logged out and all the other sessions for the same account will be invalid - I'm not sure there is any way around that in Joomla.

[jratunh21]

you use your cpanel and password the page/directory. You set the username/password for that directory/webpage, so every time someone on the web tries to access it, it'll prompt them for log in credentials.

Another way to do it is put the users that you want to give access to that page in a special group and change their access levels, so that when they sign on, it will show up for them and anyone who is added in the group that you create(ed).