Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV)

Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) is an extension of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) that allows clients to perform remote Web content authoring operations. A working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) defined WebDAV in RFC 4918.

The WebDAV protocol makes the Web a readable and writable medium.[1] It provides a framework for users to create, change and move documents on a server; typically a web server or web share. The most important features of the WebDAV protocol 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 locking of files.