<span class="mw-page-title-main">WebDAV</span>

This article relies excessively on references to primary sources. Please improve this article by adding secondary or tertiary sources. Find sources: "WebDAV" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR  (September 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

WebDAV

<p><b>WebDAV</b> (<b>Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning</b>) is a set of extensions to the <a href="/en/Hypertext_Transfer_Protocol" title="Hypertext Transfer Protocol" class="mw-redirect wl">Hypertext Transfer Protocol</a> (HTTP), which allows <a href="/en/User_agent" title="User agent" class="wl">user agents</a> to collaboratively author contents <i>directly</i> in an <a href="/en/Web_server" title="Web server" class="wl">HTTP web server</a> by providing facilities for <a href="/en/Concurrency_control" title="Concurrency control" class="wl">concurrency control</a> and <a href="/en/Namespace" title="Namespace" class="wl">namespace operations</a>, thus allowing <a href="/en/World_Wide_Web" title="World Wide Web" class="wl">Web</a> to be viewed as a <i>writeable, collaborative medium</i> and not just a read-only medium.<span class="mw-ref reference" id="cite_ref-FOOTNOTEWhiteheadGoland1999293_1-0"><a href="#cite_note-FOOTNOTEWhiteheadGoland1999293-1" style="counter-reset: mw-Ref 1;"><span class="mw-reflink-text">[1]</span></a></span> WebDAV is defined in <a href="/en/RFC_(identifier)" title="RFC (identifier)" class="mw-redirect wl">RFC</a><span>&nbsp;</span><a rel="mw:ExtLink nofollow" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc4918" class="external text" target="_blank">4918</a> by a <a href="/en/Working_group" title="Working group" class="wl">working group</a> of the <a href="/en/Internet_Engineering_Task_Force" title="Internet Engineering Task Force" class="wl">Internet Engineering Task Force</a> (IETF).<span class="mw-ref reference" id="cite_ref-FOOTNOTEWhitehead199834_2-0"><a href="#cite_note-FOOTNOTEWhitehead199834-2" style="counter-reset: mw-Ref 2;"><span class="mw-reflink-text">[2]</span></a></span></p>

<div class="shortdescription nomobile noexcerpt noprint searchaux" style="display:none" about="#mwt1">HTTP Extension for collaborative editing</div>
<style data-mw-deduplicate="TemplateStyles:r1097763485" typeof="mw:Extension/templatestyles mw:Transclusion">.mw-parser-output .ambox{border:1px solid #a2a9b1;border-left:10px solid #36c;background-color:#fbfbfb;box-sizing:border-box}.mw-parser-output .ambox+link+.ambox,.mw-parser-output .ambox+link+style+.ambox,.mw-parser-output .ambox+link+link+.ambox,.mw-parser-output .ambox+.mw-empty-elt+link+.ambox,.mw-parser-output .ambox+.mw-empty-elt+link+style+.ambox,.mw-parser-output .ambox+.mw-empty-elt+link+link+.ambox{margin-top:-1px}html body.mediawiki .mw-parser-output .ambox.mbox-small-left{margin:4px 1em 4px 0;overflow:hidden;width:238px;border-collapse:collapse;font-size:88%;line-height:1.25em}.mw-parser-output .ambox-speedy{border-left:10px solid #b32424;background-color:#fee7e6}.mw-parser-output .ambox-delete{border-left:10px solid #b32424}.mw-parser-output .ambox-content{border-left:10px solid #f28500}.mw-parser-output .ambox-style{border-left:10px solid #fc3}.mw-parser-output .ambox-move{border-left:10px solid #9932cc}.mw-parser-output .ambox-protection{border-left:10px solid #a2a9b1}.mw-parser-output .ambox .mbox-text{border:none;padding:0.25em 0.5em;width:100%}.mw-parser-output .ambox .mbox-image{border:none;padding:2px 0 2px 0.5em;text-align:center}.mw-parser-output .ambox .mbox-imageright{border:none;padding:2px 0.5em 2px 0;text-align:center}.mw-parser-output .ambox .mbox-empty-cell{border:none;padding:0;width:1px}.mw-parser-output .ambox .mbox-image-div{width:52px}html.client-js body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .mbox-text-span{margin-left:23px!important}@media(min-width:720px){.mw-parser-output .ambox{margin:0 10%}}</style>
<style data-mw-deduplicate="TemplateStyles:r1066479718" typeof="mw:Extension/templatestyles mw:Transclusion">.mw-parser-output .infobox-subbox{padding:0;border:none;margin:-3px;width:auto;min-width:100%;font-size:100%;clear:none;float:none;background-color:transparent}.mw-parser-output .infobox-3cols-child{margin:auto}.mw-parser-output .infobox .navbar{font-size:100%}body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-header,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-subheader,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-above,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-title,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-image,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-full-data,body.skin-minerva .mw-parser-output .infobox-below{text-align:center}</style><div class='mobile-collapse'><header class="mobile-collapse-header mobile-collapse-btn"><b>Quick facts: OSI layer, Port(s), RFC(s), Website...</b> <span class='arrow'>▼</span></header> <table class="infobox vevent mobile-collapse-element" style="width:26em;"><caption class="infobox-title summary">WebDAV</caption><tbody><tr><td colspan="2" class="infobox-subheader"><a href="/en/Communication_protocol" title="Communication protocol" class="wl">Communication protocol</a></td></tr><tr><th scope="row" class="infobox-label" style="white-space: nowrap; width:25%;"><a href="/en/OSI_model" title="OSI model" class="wl">OSI layer</a></th><td class="infobox-data"><a href="/en/Application_layer" title="Application layer" class="wl">Application</a></td></tr><tr><th scope="row" class="infobox-label" style="white-space: nowrap; width:25%;"><a href="/en/Port_(computer_networking)" title="Port (computer networking)" class="wl">Port(s)</a></th><td class="infobox-data">80, 443</td></tr><tr><th scope="row" class="infobox-label" style="white-space: nowrap; width:25%;"><a href="/en/Request_for_Comments" title="Request for Comments" class="wl">RFC(s)</a></th><td class="infobox-data"><a href="https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2518" rel="mw:ExtLink nofollow" class="external mw-magiclink" target="_blank">RFC 2518</a>, <style data-mw-deduplicate="TemplateStyles:r1133582631" typeof="mw:Extension/templatestyles">.mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit;word-wrap:break-word}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"\"""\"""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation:target{background-color:rgba(0,127,255,0.133)}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-free a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/65/Lock-green.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .id-lock-registration a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-subscription a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg")right 0.1em center/12px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:none;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#3a3;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right{padding-right:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .citation .mw-selflink{font-weight:inherit}</style><a href="/en/RFC_(identifier)" title="RFC (identifier)" class="mw-redirect wl">RFC</a><span>&nbsp;</span><a rel="mw:ExtLink nofollow" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc4918" class="external text" target="_blank">4918</a></td></tr><tr><th scope="row" class="infobox-label" style="white-space: nowrap; width:25%;">Website</th><td class="infobox-data url"><span class="url"><a rel="mw:ExtLink nofollow" href="http://www.webdav.org" class="external text" target="_blank">www<wbr>.webdav<wbr>.org</a></span></td></tr></tbody></table> <footer class='mobile-collapse-footer mobile-collapse-btn'><b>Close</b> <span class='arrow'>▲</span></footer></div>

<p>The WebDAV protocol provides a framework for users to create, change and move documents on a <a href="/en/Server_(computing)" title="Server (computing)" class="wl">server</a>. The most important features include the maintenance of properties about an author or modification date, <a href="/en/Namespace" title="Namespace" class="wl">namespace</a> management, collections, and overwrite protection. Maintenance of properties includes such things as the creation, removal, and querying of file information. Namespace management deals with the ability to copy and move web pages within a server's namespace. Collections deal with the creation, removal, and listing of various resources. Lastly, overwrite protection handles aspects related to the locking of files. It takes advantage of existing technologies such as <a href="/en/Transport_Layer_Security" title="Transport Layer Security" class="wl">Transport Layer Security</a>, <a href="/en/Digest_access_authentication" title="Digest access authentication" class="wl">digest access authentication</a> or <a href="/en/XML" title="XML" class="wl">XML</a> to satisfy those requirements.<span class="mw-ref reference" id="cite_ref-FOOTNOTEWhiteheadGoland1999294_3-0"><a href="#cite_note-FOOTNOTEWhiteheadGoland1999294-3" style="counter-reset: mw-Ref 3;"><span class="mw-reflink-text">[3]</span></a></span></p>

<p>Many modern <a href="/en/Operating_system" title="Operating system" class="wl">operating systems</a> provide built-in <a href="/en/Client-side" title="Client-side" class="wl">client-side</a> support for WebDAV.</p>



WebDAV is a set of extensions to the Hypertext Transfer Protocol , which allows user agents to collaboratively author contents directly in an HTTP web server by providing facilities for concurrency control and namespace operations, thus allowing Web to be viewed as a writeable, collaborative medium and not just a read-only medium. The WebDAV protocol provides a framework for users to create, change and move documents on a server. The most important features include the maintenance of properties about an author or modification date, namespace management, collections, and overwrite protection. Maintenance of properties includes such things as the creation, removal, and querying of file information. Namespace management deals with the ability to copy and move web pages within a server's namespace. Collections deal with the creation, removal, and listing of various resources. Lastly, overwrite protection handles aspects related to the locking of files. It takes advantage of existing technologies such as Transport Layer Security, digest access authentication or XML to satisfy those requirements. Many modern operating systems provide built-in client-side support for WebDAV. 