Handling a Large Number of Users

<DirectoryMatch /home/*/public_html>    AuthType Basic    AuthName "Private Area"    AuthDBMUserFile /usr/local/apache2/conf/dbmusers    AuthDBMGroupFile /usr/local/apache2/conf/dbmusers    AuthDBMAuthoritative on    Require group student faculty </DirectoryMatch>

The mod_auth_dbm module is equivalent in functionality to mod_auth, but stores user data in a file-based database, speeding data lookup when there is a large number of users. This module provides a number of directives such as AuthDBMAuthoritative, AuthDBMUserFile, and AuthDBMGroupFile, which are equivalent in syntax and functionality to the plain-text ones provided by mod_auth. To manipulate the user and group files, you will need to use htdbm and dbmmanage, the counterparts to mod_auth's tools. Note that group and user data can be stored in the same database, as shown here.