.htacess password protection folder

[eluser]searain[/eluser]
http://ellislab.com/forums/viewthread/142001/#698395

This gives the answer.

All I need to do is add one more line in root .htaccess

RewriteCond $1 !^(401.shtml)

Code:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond $1 !^(index\.php|images|captcha|css|js|php|robots\.txt)
RewriteCond $1 !^(401.shtml)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /index.php/$1 [L]

Then I can put .php under .htaccess protection.