Does auth_basic changes require a service reload?

[TECK]

Hi,

I'm wondering if I need to perform a "service nginx restart", if I do
any changes to htpasswd file:
location / {
    auth_basic           "closed site";
    auth_basic_user_file htpasswd;
}

I noticed that sometimes it works without reloading the service.

Posted at Nginx Forum: http://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,225777,225777#msg-225777