security and .htaccess

Hi, I'm working on .htaccess file for improving security. Based on documentation from PHPSEC.org, we should be able to store DB_USER login and DB_PASS password in some secret-stuff (for example) file, which should be located outside root of web document root. (for example in some /path_to_secret folder) normally we should configure httpd.conf file to include this secret-stuff file, but in my case, i have a web hoster who does not allow me to modify the httpd.conf. However, i should be able to setup an .htaccess file. How can i setup/include this secret-stuff file in this .htaccess file (without decreasing security) ? thanks a lot. Alain ------------------------------------ Windows XP SP2 PostgreSQL 8.1.4 Apache 2.0.58 PHP 5