using file_get_contents to authenticate and access an htaccess protected file [duplicate]

Answer 1

Off-hand, I believe you can use a context to do that:

$context = stream_context_create(array (
    'http' => array (
        'header' => 'Authorization: Basic ' . base64_encode("$username:$password")
    )
));
$data = file_get_contents($url, false, $context);