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11.3. Authentication

HTTP Basic Authentication is the most common type of authentication supported at the level of HTTP. The exchange works like this:

  1. The browser makes a request for a URL.
  2. The page is protected by Basic Authentication, so the server replies with a 401 Unauthorized status code. The response has a WWW-Authenticate header that specifies the authentication method ("basic") and the realm. "Realm" here is jargon for a string that identifies the locked-off area, which the browser is about to use in the next step.

  3. The browser displays an "enter your username and password for realm" dialog box. Figure 11-1 shows the dialog box for a part of www.unicode.org whose realm name is "Unicode-MailList-Archives."

  4. The browser requests the URL again, this time with an Authorization header that encodes the username and password.

  5. If the username and password are verified, the server sends the document in a normal successful HTTP response. If the username and password aren't correct, we go back to step 2.

Figure 11-1

Figure 11-1. Authentication dialog box



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