Security w/ BB & DB's

[TheSaint]

I want to restrict who can gain access to the bulletin boards and the databases. How can I password protect these pages?

I am building an alumni website and only want those people to have access to the information. I am thinking of setting the password and changing it about every 4-6 months.

What I was thinking was when the users click on the link to either of these areas have the username and password box appear. Where would I find code for that? Is there an easier/more secure way?

Sorry this is kinda basic but I am new to trying to restrict who my users are.

Thanks

[KLH]

If you have the forums in their old folder (example, forums folder) then you can password protect that folder using the CP.

[TheSaint]

Thanks that is exactly what I wanted.

[JEEP_TJ_FREAK]

Depending on the board you can also just simply set their permissions.

PHPbb supports this feature, actually it is IMO the best one as it will allow you to specify users AND forums. This way you can have a helpdesk forum that everyone can access (nice for cookie and cache problems) and ever post as a guest. It can also have a admin forum only a few people can see and further any combination of the above you can image.