Accessing CI from outside the application directory

[eluser]Madmartigan1[/eluser]
This comes up all the time:

I'm trying to access CI data from a third party script that is not running under Codeigniter. Can this be done without writing a "wrapper" controller?


What I'm trying to do:

Access Codeigniter (config, lang, etc.) from a script outside the application directory.
This particular script is a file browser for TinyMCE. I'm trying to run an auth check.

What I have tried:

curl, file includes, file_get_contents(), session data

Is there a right way to approach this?
Is there a "wrong" way that will work? Open to shady solutions.

[eluser]Aidy[/eluser]
If your using the native file browser for TinyMCE you can use an external authenticator. Megabyte's code at the bottom of this post may help

http://ellislab.com/forums/viewthread/149918

[eluser]Madmartigan1[/eluser]
Using this sexy beast: http://www.neele.name/filebrowser/

It's really more of a general question, but thanks for the reply.