WebDAV on Linux

It is possible to mount a WebDAV share under Linux to access the RDMS from your machine directly. The most generic method to do so is to use the mount command via the command line interface. In order for this action to work, the davfs2 package has to be installed on your machine. As the installer for this package might vary based on your Linux distro, please check on what version of Linux your operating system is based on.

On Debian, Ubuntu and other Ubuntu-based Linux distros, this can be installed via the APT package managing utility:

$ sudo apt-get davfs2

Alternatively, on Linux distros that use RPM as their package manager (e.g. Fedora), davfs2 can be installed via:

$ yum install davfs2

or

$ dnf install davfs2

Additionally, a empty directory on the local Linux machine is needed as a mount point. To create an empty directory called rdms_webdav in your home directory, run:

$ mkdir ~/rdms_webdav/

To make the RDMS accessible at this mount point, run:

$ sudo mount -t davfs https://webdav.data.rug.nl ~/rdms_webdav/ 

After entering your RDMS username (UG mail address) and associated password, the RDMS storage becomes available at ~/rdms_webdav/.

To unmount the WebDAV mount of the RDMS via the terminal, run:

$ sudo umount ~/rdms_webdav/ 

Different flavors of Linux come with different desktop environments and also different file managers which can be used to easily mount network shares. In the following text, the steps to mount the RDMS via WebDAV for the three file managers GNOME Files, Dolphin and Thunar are explained.

If you are unsure about the standard file manager on your Linux system, you can display this information by running the following command in the terminal:

$ xdg-mime query default inode/directory

The standard file manager of the GNOME desktop environment is GNOME Files, formerly known as Nautilus. Open the file manager and select Other locations. As server address use davs://webdav.data.rug.nl and press Connect.

After entering the username and password, the RDMS WebDAV becomes available via the GNOME Files file manager as webdav.data.rug.nl.

The standard file manager of the KDE desktop environment is called Dolphin. To connect to the RDMS WebDAV, open the Dolphin file manager, select Network to specify a remote network location. In the field for the remote address, type webdavs://webdav.data.rug.nl and hit Enter. You will be asked for your username and password, and RDMS WebDAV becomes available after giving correct credentials.

The standard file manager of the Xfce desktop environment is called Thunar. To connect to the RDMS WebDAV, open the Thunar file manager and select Browse Network. Enter webdavs://webdav.data.rug.nl in the address bar of the newly opened window and hit Enter. You will be asked for your username and password, and RDMS WebDAV becomes available after giving correct credentials.