WebDAV: what it is, what it does, why you need it

Abstract

Legacy network file services such as NFS, SMB/CIFS, and AFP changed the way we worked. File services running on cross-platform networks allowed us to save our files on remote systems and changed the way we exchanged files with each other. Web technology changed our lives and the way we work again. In the fall of 2002, due to the demand for a web integrated network file service with powerful content management capabilities, we are offering WebDAV (Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning) service in our instructional computer laboratories at Ringling School of Art and Design. WebDAV is a set of extensions to HTTP (the protocol that drives the web), which allows users to collaborate with each other to edit and manage files on web servers across the network.WebDAV allows our institution to host a shared file space for each course. Students in a course can access the shared space for collaboration with the instructor and other students in the same course. Access to the WebDAV share is seamless by incorporating LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) into the system to maintain single sign-on.In our implementation, we have integrated the Apache web server, Apache extensions for WebDAV and the LDAP based meta-directory model for user authentication information. Furthermore, we have implemented a Perl script, which runs every hour to monitor WebDAV storage usage and triggers alarms for any disk quota breach.In this technical report, we will share our framework, tips and tricks we learned from our deployment of WebDAV with our colleagues. We will explain how legacy network file services can be strengthened by providing WebDAV service on both the Windows and Unix platforms. Furthermore, we will discuss the issues we had to address and the lessons we learned during and after the deployment process.