Configuring WebDAV Access

A complete set of document management functionality is accessible directly from the Microsoft Office toolbar and the Microsoft Windows Explorer using the WebDAV protocol. codebeamer enables WebDAV access to its repository using the following URL:

<CodeBeamer URL>/cb/webfolder

For example, to access a codebeamer installation on the local host, use the following WebDAV URL:

http://localhost:8080/cb/webfolder
or
https://codebeamer.com/cb/webfolder

WebDAV rejects HTTPS connection on sites with invalid certificate.

Enable WebDAV access on Windows 10

1. Open a File explorer ► Computer tab ► Map network drive:
   

1. In the next dialog enter the WerbDAV URL of the codebeamer server:
   

1. Provide the codebeamer user name and password.
2. After the successful connection the Documents of codebeamer can be accessed.

Enable WebDAV access on Windows 7

To enable WebDAV access Windows Vista and Windows 7, known configuration issues need to be resolved on these operating systems:

• http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941050
• http://www.greenbytes.de/tech/webdav/webdav-redirector-list.html#issue-server-discovery

• Windows 7 Web Folders (WEBDAV) with Apache basic auth with SSL

To enable WebDAV access

• Windows Start menu ► Computer ► Map network drive

• Within the Map network drive dialog, enter the WebDAV address: https://yourcodebeamerdomain/cb/webfolder (eg.: https://codebeamer.com/cb/webfolder or http://localhost:8080/cb/webfolder ) and select the two checkboxes at the bottom. Click on [Finish] to finalize.

• On the next dialog enter your codebeamer account/password.

Enable WebDAV access on MAC OS

To enable WebDAV access:

1. Go to Finder ► Go ► Connect to Server...
2. Enter the WebDAV URL i.e. https://codebeamer.com/cb/webfolder
3. On the next dialog, enter the codebeamer account/password.
4. To prevent .DS_Store file creation, open Terminal and execute the below command:
   

   defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores true

5. Either restart the computer or log out and back in to the user account.

See more to prevent .DS_Store file creation over WebDav connections on http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1629

Accessing WebDAV Documents using a web browser

The WebDAV documents can be browsed and downloaded using a web browser (Chrome or Firefox for example) too by opening the WebDAV url of codebeamer from your browser. For example: CB:/webfolder opens the WebDAV on codebeamer.com.

Keeping Document History

WebDAV doesn't support update operation, therefore editing a document over WebDAV connection equals to a delete-and-create operation sequence. Because delete operation eliminates version history the following experimental feature has been introduced since codebeamer 7.1.3. If a document is deleted and recreated by the same user in a certain period of time the deleted document is restored and the created one is regarded as a new version. This feature can be enabled and configured in general.xml file by the auto_restore_from_trash property in <document>XML tag, where the property value is the time period. An example for setting it to 30 seconds (XML fragment):

<document auto_restore_from_trash="30s"

This is an experimental feature and currently not officially supported.

Troubleshooting

Map Network drive fails with Windows cannot access ... - network name cannot be found

When connecting from Windows-based OS, the webdav connection is handled by the standard windows service WebClient.

Ensure the service is running and set to Automatic in services:

If the folder cannot be reached, restart this service.

Server port configuration check

Webdav uses the codebeamer port. Default is 8080 that can be configured in /install_dir/tomcat/conf/server.xml as below:

<Connector
   port="8080"
   protocol="HTTP/1.1"
   redirectPort="8443"
   URIEncoding="UTF-8"
   acceptCount="200"
   maxPostSize="-1"
   maxThreads="250"
   enableLookups="false"
   connectionTimeout="80000"
   maxHttpHeaderSize="16384"
   maxSwallowSize="-1">
</Connector>

In case of using codebeamer via eg. apache, the connector below should be configured:

    <Connector port="8009"
            acceptCount="100"
            maxPostSize="0"
            maxThreads="100" minSpareThreads="4" maxSpareThreads="10"
               enableLookups="false" redirectPort="8443" protocol="AJP/1.3"
               connectionTimeout="80000"
            request.registerRequests="false"
            disableUploadTimeout="true"
            useBodyEncodingForURI="true"
        ></Connector>

A useful external link about how to configure WebDAV clients: https://doc.owncloud.org/server/9.1/user_manual/files/access_webdav.html

See also:Application Configuration via Environment Variables