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Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning, or WebDAV, is a set of extensions to the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) that allows computer-users to edit and manage files collaboratively on remote World Wide Web servers. RFC 4918 defines the extensions. The group of developers responsible for these extensions was also known by the same name and was a working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The WebDAV protocol allows interactivity, making the Web a readable and writable medium, in line with Tim Berners-Lee's original vision.[1] It allows users to create, change and move documents on a remote server (typically a web server or "web share"). This has obvious uses when authoring the documents that a web server serves, but it can also be used for storing files on the web, so that the files can be accessed from anywhere. The most important features of the WebDAV protocol include:
As of 2009[update] many modern operating systems provide built-in support for WebDAV. The WebDAV working group concluded its work in March 2007, after the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG) accepted an incremental update to RFC 2518. Other extensions left unfinished at that time, such as the BIND method, will be finished by their individual authors, independent of the formal working group.
[edit] HistoryWebDAV began in 1996 when Jim Whitehead worked with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to host two meetings to discuss the problem of distributed authoring on the World Wide Web with interested people.[2][3] Tim Berners-Lee's original vision of the Web envisaged a medium for both reading and writing. In fact, Berners-Lee's first web browser, called WorldWideWeb, was able to both view and edit web pages; but, as the Web grew, it became, for most users, a read-only medium. Whitehead and other like-minded people wanted to fix that limitation.[4] The W3C meeting decided that the best way to proceed was to form an IETF working group, because the new effort would lead to extensions to HTTP, which was being standardized at the IETF. As work began on the protocol, it became clear that handling both distributed authoring and versioning would involve too much work and that the tasks would have to be separated. The WebDAV group focused on distributed authoring, and left versioning for the future. Versioning was added later by the Delta-V extension — see the Extensions section below. The protocol consists of a set of new methods and headers for use in HTTP. It became (almost certainly) the first protocol ever to use XML[citation needed]. The added methods include:
[edit] Implementations[edit] LinuxLinux users can mount WebDAV shares using davfs2 or fusedav which mount them as coda or FUSE filesystems. KDE has native WebDAV support as part of kio_http[5]. This enables Konqueror[6] and other KDE applications to directly interact with WebDAV servers. Nautilus[7] also has WebDAV support built in. The cadaver command-line client, which provides an FTP-like command set, is included in many Linux distributions. [edit] Mac OS XMac OS X version 10.0 and following support WebDAV shares natively as a type of filesystem. The system can mount WebDAV-enabled server directories to the filesystem using the traditional BSD mounting mechanism. Mac OS X version 10.1.1 introduced support for HTTP Digest Access authentication. Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) extended WebDAV interoperability to include support for the https scheme, proxies, and additional methods of authentication.[8] The Finder presents a WebDAV share as an external disk, allowing users to interact with WebDAV just as they would with any other filesystem. Apple's iDisk uses WebDAV for file access.[9] [edit] Microsoft WindowsMicrosoft introduced WebDAV client support in Microsoft Windows 98 with a feature called "Web folders". This client consisted of an OLE object which could be accessed by any OLE software, and was installed as an extension to Windows Explorer (the desktop/file manager) and was later included in Windows 2000. In Windows XP, Microsoft added the "WebDAV mini-redirector" which is preferred by default over the old Web folders client. This newer client works as a system service at the network-redirector level (immediately above the file-system), allowing WebDAV shares to be assigned to a drive letter and used by any software. The redirector also allows WebDAV shares to be addressed via UNC paths (e.g. http://host/path/ is converted to \\host\path\) for compatibility with Windows filesystem APIs. However, some versions of the redirector are known to have some limitations in authentication support.[10] Recent versions are known to disable basic authentication for HTTP connections for security purposes. Some suggested workarounds for problems in some versions include:[citation needed]
In addition, WebDAV over HTTPS works only if a computer has KB892211-version files or newer installed. Otherwise Windows displays "The folder you entered does not appear to be valid. Please choose another" when adding a network resource. NOTE: 892211 has been superseded by KB907306. Windows Vista includes only the WebDAV redirector unless a version of Office, Internet Explorer, OLE-DB or "Microsoft Update for Web Folders" has been installed which includes the original "Web folders" client. The update will only work on the 32bit version of XP/Vista.[12] [edit] Current alternatives to WebDAVThe SMB protocol allows Microsoft Windows and open-source Samba clients to access and manage files and folders remotely on a suitable file server. More recently[when?], Microsoft introduced and developed a range of SharePoint server products that also allow remote authors to manage lists and folders of remote, shared files. SharePoint server uses webdav as back end to document content module. As of 2009[update] many CMS, wiki, blog, revision control and other authoring and versioning systems are based on XML SOAP web service APIs, using the HTTP 'POST' and 'GET' verbs. If they use RESTful techniques, then other HTTP verbs such as 'PUT' and 'DELETE' may also be deployed meaningfully in ways that are comparable to WebDAV[citation needed] . WebDAV also specifies more specialised verbs such as 'COPY', 'MOVE', 'LOCK' etc., as described above. [edit] Documents produced by the working groupThe WebDAV working group produced several works:
[edit] Other documents published through IETF
[edit] Extensions and derivatives
[edit] See also[edit] External links[edit] References
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