I figured out a way to do this. I used Apache mod_rerwrite to see if the user is requesting the RSS feed (the query string in the URL) and if so set an environment variable. Then your “allow from” statement allows the user access if the variable is set. The “satisfy any” would be important to allow a password or the variable.
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^feed=rss2$
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ $1 [E=rss:yes]
<Location "/secretblog/">
Order allow,deny
Allow from env=rss
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Ask Me for the password"
AuthUserFile /etc/apache2/users
Require valid-user
Satisfy any
</Location>
—
http://www.runningunix.com