[Using Sakai] WebDAV & Sakai

[Neal Caidin]

What version of Sakai are you using?
What operating system are you using WebDav on (Mac OS X, Windows 7, Windows
8, etc.)?

I know a lot of work has gone into making WebDav work with Sakai, but it
hasn't been easy. A lot of times the backup plan has been to use a 3rd
party tool for the WebDav connection, like Cyberduck (seems to be the most
popular). I assume that the problem is more on the WebDav technology than
Sakai technology but not being a "guru" , I can not say definitively.

Starting with Sakai 10, we added drag and drop for Resources and that has
proved to be a popular alternative to WebDav and easier to use. In Chrome,
one can drag whole folders over. Other browsers individual files.

-- Neal


On Thu, Feb 12, 2015 at 3:58 PM, Marshall Feldman <marsh at uri.edu> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Last week I tried using WebDAV with our local Sakai implementation and
> couldn't get it to work properly. So I asked our local Sakai support for
> help using WebDAV on Sakai, but the answer I got back was really about
> ways to use Sakai without using WebDAV (e.g., zip files to move multiple
> files at once). So I wrote back and gave a description of what I want to
> do and why only WebDAV or something very much like it (e.g., NFS) would
> work. But in retrospect it seems to me this was also off topic. My
> question simply is how does one make WebDAV work with Sakai, and if it
> doesn't work with Sakai then why does Sakai advertise its use (in
> Resources)? I never really got an answer.
>
> The support person did briefly mention some technical issues which seem
> to make WebDAV and Sakai incompatible. Here's what I understand. Our
> implementation of Sakai runs in a cluster. When WebDAV first connects to
> Sakai it connects to a specific instance of the Sakai file system in the
> cluster. But during any given session Sakai may want to use a different
> instance in the cluster. Since WebDAV is still connected to the original
> instance, it breaks.
>
> It seems to me that if this interpretation is roughly correct, then one
> of these two implications is too. (1) Sakai is incompatible with WebDAV,
> in which case the instructions in Resources about using WebDAV with
> Sakai should be removed. Otherwise, they just waste everyone's time. (2)
> Somebody actually went into Sakai's file management routines and
> modified them so that WebDAV behaves properly. Perhaps this is an add-on
> or particular settings for various parameters set when configuring
> Sakai. But for some reason this feature has not been properly
> implemented here at my institution.
>
> Could one of you gurus enlighten me about this?
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