WebDAV

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WebDAV is an IETF working group. The abbreviation stands for Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning. The term is also used to refer to the protocol (more accurately, the extension to the HTTP protocol) which the group defined.

The WebDAV protocol's aim is to make the World Wide Web a readable and writable medium, in line with Tim Berners-Lee's original vision. It provides functionality to create, change and move documents on a remote server (typically a web server). This is useful, among other things, for authoring the documents which a web server serves, but can also be used for general web-based file storage, that can be accessed from anywhere. Most modern operating systems provide built-in support for WebDAV, making it as easy to use files on a WebDAV server (almost) as if they were stored in a local directory.

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History

WebDAV started life when Jim Whitehead convinced the W3C to host two meetings where people interested in the problem of distributed authoring on the World Wide Web could get together to discuss possible solutions. The original vision of the World Wide Web as expounded by Tim Berners-Lee was a both readable and writable medium. In fact Tim's first web browser, called WorldWideWeb, was capable of both viewing and editing remote pages. However as the web grew it turned itself into a read only medium. Jim and other like minded people wanted to fix that limitation.

The group of people meeting at the W3C decided that the best way to proceed was to form an IETF working group. The IETF seemed a natural choice as the HTTP protocol was being standardized there and it was assumed that the output of this effort would consist of extensions to that protocol.

As work began on the protocol it became clear that handling both distributed authoring and versioning was just too much and that the tasks would have to be separated. The WebDAV working group therefore decided to just focus on distributed authoring and leave versioning for the future. In fact members commonly joked that the group should properly be called WebDA.

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Documents produced by the working group

The WebDAV working group has to date produced several outputs:

  • a requirements document: "Requirements for a Distributed Authoring and Versioning Protocol for the World Wide Web" RFC 2291,
  • a base protocol document: "HTTP Extensions for Distributed Authoring -- WEBDAV" RFC 2518,
  • the ordered collections protocol: "Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) Ordered Collections Protocol" RFC 3648,
  • the access control protocol: "Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) Access Control Protocol" RFC 3744,
  • a quota specification: "Quota and Size Properties for Distributed Authoring and Versioning (DAV) Collections" RFC 4331, and
  • a redirect specification: "Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) Redirect Reference Resources" RFC 4437.

The protocol consists of a set of new methods and headers for use in HTTP and has the distinction of almost certainly being the first protocol ever to use XML.

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Documents not produced by the working group, but published through the IETF

  • a specification of WebDAV property datatypes: "Datatypes for Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) Properties" RFC 4316.
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Overview of the protocol

WebDAV added the following methods to HTTP:

  • PROPFIND — Used to retrieve properties, persisted as XML, from a resource. It is also overloaded to allow one to retrieve the collection structure (a.k.a. directory hierarchy) of a remote system.
  • PROPPATCH — Used to change and delete multiple properties on a resource in a single atomic act.
  • MKCOL — Used to create collections (a.k.a. directory).
  • COPY — Used to copy a resource from one URI to another.
  • MOVE — Used to move a resource from one URI to another.
  • LOCK — Used to put a lock on a resource, WebDAV supports both shared and exclusive locks.
  • UNLOCK — To remove a lock from a resource.
  • SEARCH — Used to initiate a server-side search.

Resource is HTTP's name for a referent: that which is pointed to by a URI.

The WebDAV working group is still working on a number of extensions to WebDAV including - bindings, and on progressing the base specification to the next maturity level in the Internet Standards track.

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Related work

The WebDAV working group spawned other IETF working groups including the DAV Searching and Locating (DASL) working group and the Web Versioning and Configuration Management (DELTAV) working group.

DASL never produced any official standard although there are a number of implementations of its last draft (work continues as non-working-group activity, see DASL).

DELTAV produced the Versioning Extensions to WebDAV RFC 3253 which put the V back into WebDAV.

The WebDAV Home Page contains up-to-date information about implementations of WebDAV and WebDAV related standards efforts.

GroupDAV is a variant of WebDAV which allows client/server groupware systems to store and fetch objects such as calendar items and address book entries instead of web pages.

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Software supporting WebDAV

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Servers

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Clients

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Services

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See also

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External links

de:WebDAV es:WebDAV fr:WebDAV nl:WebDAV ja:WebDAV pl:Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning ru:WebDAV fi:WebDAV

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