[support] Authentication from an external script when using API's??

Hi,

I am attempting to access the Drupal data from an external php script..

I am able to connect to drupal with the following..

//Bootstrap Drupal $drupal_path = '/var/www'; chdir($drupal_path); //Path to drupal $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'] = '127.0.0.1'; define('DRUPAL_ROOT', $drupal_path); require_once './includes/bootstrap.inc'; drupal_bootstrap(DRUPAL_BOOTSTRAP_FULL);

So that's fine..

Now I am trying to access content that doesn't have anonymous view access so I need to authenticate the external script somehow..

Can anyone point me in the right direction as to what API's I need to use to authenticate to drupal in order to access the content?

Thanks..