- From: Julian Reschke <julian.reschke@gmx.de>
- Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2005 14:36:47 +0200
- To: w3c-dist-auth@w3.org
- Message-ID: <42EA22DF.6000805@gmx.de>
Hi, this document (<http://greenbytes.de/tech/webdav/draft-reschke-webdav-mount-latest.html>) describes an extremely simple and platform/browser independant protocol/format for WebDAV servers to instruct the local webdav client to mount a specific URL and open a window (for a child collection of it). We intend to support this format in future SAP Netweaver releases, but it's designed to be open and extensible (thus we're choosing the IETF process). Server implementation is trivial; at this point we're mainly looking for the feedback from client programmers (Jim L., are you listening??? :-). Note: the draft hasn't been submitted to the IETF yet (because of the forthcoming IETF meeting). Best regards, Julian
Network Working Group J. Reschke
Internet-Draft greenbytes
Expires: January 30, 2006 July 29, 2005
Mounting WebDAV (Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning) servers
draft-reschke-webdav-mount-latest
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Copyright Notice
Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2005).
Abstract
This document specifies a mechanism and a document format that allow
WebDAV servers to send "mounting" information to a WebDAV client.
The protocol is designed to work on any platform and with any
combination of browser and WebDAV client, relying solely on the well-
understood dispatch of documents through their MIME type.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1 url . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.2 open . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
4. Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5.1 MIME type registration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
7. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
7.1 Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
7.2 Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
A. Alternative approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
A.1 ...through HTML/CSS extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
A.2 ...through custom URI schemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . 9
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1. Introduction
By definition, a WebDAV server ([RFC2518]) is an HTTP server as well
([RFC2616]). Most WebDAV servers can be (at least partly) operated
from an HTML-based user interface in a web browser. However, it is
frequently desirable to be able to switch from an HTML-based view to
a presentation provided by a native WebDAV client, directly
supporting the authoring features defined in WebDAV and related
specifications.
For completeness, Appendix A lists other approaches that have been
implemented in existing clients.
2. Terminology
The terminology used here follows and extends that in the WebDAV
Distributed Authoring Protocol specification [RFC2518].
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119].
This document uses XML DTD fragments ([XML]) as a purely notational
convention. In particular:
o Element names use the namespace
"http://purl.org/NET/webdav/mount".
o Element ordering is irrelevant.
o Extension elements/attributes (elements/attributes not already
defined as valid child elements) may be added anywhere, except
when explicitly stated otherwise.
3. Format
A WebDAV mount request is encoded in a specific XML format ([XML])
with a well-defined MIME type (see Section 5.1). The MIME type
allows user agents to dispatch the content to a handler specific to
the system's WebDAV client.
The elements defined below use the namespace
"http://purl.org/NET/webdav/mount".
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<!ELEMENT mount (url, open?) >
<!ELEMENT url (#PCDATA) >
<!-- PCDATA value: scheme ":" hier-part, as defined in section 3 of
[RFC3986] -->
<!ELEMENT open (#PCDATA) >
<!-- PCDATA value: path, as defined in section 3 of
[RFC3986] -->
3.1 url
The mandatory <url> element provides the HTTP URL of the WebDAV
collection that should be mounted by the client.
3.2 open
The optional <open> element instructs the client to display the
specified child collection; it's URL is computed by concatenating
this element's value with the URL obtained from the <mount-url>
element.
4. Example
In the example below, the server instructs the user agent to mount
the WebDAV URL "http://www.example.com/documents" in it's WebDAV
client, and then to open the child collection "/user42/inbox",
identified by the URL
""http://www.example.com/documents/user42/inbox".
>> Request:
GET /Coll/&mount-me HTTP/1.1
Host: www.example.com
>> Response:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/davmount+xml
Content-Length: xxx
<mount xmlns="http://purl.org/NET/webdav/mount">
<url>http://www.example.com/documents</url>
<open>/user42/inbox</open>
</mount>
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5. IANA Considerations
5.1 MIME type registration
MIME media type name:
application
MIME subtype name:
davmount+xml
Mandatory parameters:
none
Optional parameters:
"charset": This parameter has identical semantics to the charset
parameter of the "application/xml" media type as specified in
[RFC3023].
Encoding considerations:
Identical to those of "application/xml" as described in [RFC3023],
section 3.2.
Security considerations:
As defined in this specification. In addition, as this media type
uses the "+xml" convention, it shares the same security
considerations as described in [RFC3023], section 10.
Interoperability considerations:
There are no known interoperability issues.
Published specification:
This specification.
Additional information:
Magic number(s):
As specified for "application/xml" in [RFC3023], section 3.2.
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File extension:
.davmount
Fragment identifiers:
As specified for "application/xml" in [RFC3023], section 5.
Base URI:
As specified in [RFC3023], section 6.
Macintosh File Type code:
TEXT
Person and email address to contact for further information:
Julian Reschke <julian.reschke@greenbytes.de>
Intended usage:
COMMON
Author/Change controller:
IESG
6. Security Considerations
[[anchor8: forgetmenot]]
7. References
7.1 Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC2518] Goland, Y., Whitehead, E., Faizi, A., Carter, S., and D.
Jensen, "HTTP Extensions for Distributed Authoring --
WEBDAV", RFC 2518, February 1999.
[RFC2616] Fielding, R., Gettys, J., Mogul, J., Frystyk, H.,
Masinter, L., Leach, P., and T. Berners-Lee, "Hypertext
Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1", RFC 2616, June 1999.
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[RFC3023] Murata, M., St.Laurent, S., and D. Kohn, "XML Media
Types", RFC 3023, January 2001.
[RFC3986] Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66,
RFC 3986, January 2005.
[XML] Bray, T., Paoli, J., Sperberg-McQueen, C., Maler, E., and
F. Yergeau, "Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.0 (Third
Edition)", W3C REC-xml-20040204, February 2004,
<http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-xml-20040204>.
7.2 Informative References
[WEBARCH] Walsh, N. and I. Jacobs, "Architecture of the World Wide
Web, Volume One", W3C REC REC-webarch-20041215,
December 2004,
<http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-webarch-20041215/>.
Author's Address
Julian F. Reschke
greenbytes GmbH
Salzmannstrasse 152
Muenster, NW 48159
Germany
Phone: +49 251 2807760
Fax: +49 251 2807761
Email: julian.reschke@greenbytes.de
URI: http://greenbytes.de/tech/webdav/
Appendix A. Alternative approaches
A.1 ...through HTML/CSS extensions
Microsoft Internet Explorer implements a CSS extension that allows
switching to it's own WebDAV client ("Webfolder", see <http://
msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/author/behaviors/reference/behaviors/
anchor.asp>). However, at the time of this writing this extension
was not implemented by any other user agent.
A.2 ...through custom URI schemes
The "kio" library of the "K Desktop Enviroment"
(<http://www.kde.org/>) uses the URI scheme "webdav" to dispatch to
the system's WebDAV client. This URI scheme is not registered, nor
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supported on other platforms. Furthermore, W3C's "Architecture of
the World Wide Web, Volume One" explicitly advises against defining
new schemes when existing schemes can be used:
"A specification SHOULD reuse an existing URI scheme (rather than
create a new one) when it provides the desired properties of
identifiers and their relation to resources."
(see [WEBARCH], Section 2.4)
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Received on Friday, 29 July 2005 12:37:00 UTC