One document matched: draft-ietf-webdav-bind-01.txt

Differences from draft-ietf-webdav-bind-00.txt







  INTERNET-DRAFT                   G. Clemm 
  draft-ietf-webdav-bind-01        Rational Software 
                                   J. Crawford 
                                   IBM Research 
                                   J. Reschke 
                                   Greenbytes 
                                   J. Slein 
                                   Xerox 
                                   E.J. Whitehead 
                                   U.C. Santa Cruz 
                                    
  Expires August 7, 2003           February 7, 2003 

                        Binding Extensions to WebDAV 

  Status of this Memo 
  This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with all 
  provisions of RFC 2026, Section 10. 

  Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task 
  Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups.  Note that other groups 
  may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. 

  Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months 
  and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any 
  time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material 
  or to cite them other than as "work in progress." 

  The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at 
  http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt 

  The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at 
  http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html. 


  Abstract 
  This specification defines bindings, and the BIND method for creating 
  multiple bindings to the same resource.  Creating a new binding to a 
  resource causes at least one new URI to be mapped to that resource.  
  Servers are required to insure the integrity of any bindings that they 
  allow to be created. 













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  Table of Contents 

  1 INTRODUCTION............................................3 
  1.1 Terminology...........................................4 
  1.2 Rationale for Distinguishing Bindings from URI Mappings
      ......................................................6 

  2 OVERVIEW OF BINDINGS....................................6 
  2.1 Bindings to Collections...............................7 
  2.2 URI Mappings Created by a new Binding.................7 
  2.3 DELETE and Bindings...................................8 
  2.4 COPY and Bindings.....................................9 
  2.5 MOVE and Bindings.....................................9 
  2.6 Determining Whether Two Bindings Are to the Same Resource
      .....................................................10 
  2.7 Discovering the Bindings to a Resource...............11 

  3 PROPERTIES.............................................11 
  3.1 DAV:resource-id Property.............................12 
  3.2 DAV:parent-set Property..............................12 

  4 BIND METHOD............................................12 
  4.1 Example: BIND........................................14 

  5 ADDITIONAL STATUS CODES................................14 
  5.1 506 Loop Detected....................................14 

  6 SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS................................16 
  6.1 Privacy Concerns.....................................16 
  6.2 Redirect Loops.......................................16 
  6.3 Bindings, and Denial of Service......................16 
  6.4 Private Locations May Be Revealed....................16 
  6.5 DAV:parent-set and Denial of Service.................17 

  7 INTERNATIONALIZATION CONSIDERATIONS....................17 

  8 IANA CONSIDERATIONS....................................17 

  9 INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY..................................17 

  10  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.....................................17 

  11  REFERENCES...........................................18 

  12  AUTHORS' ADDRESSES...................................18 
    











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  1  INTRODUCTION 

       This specification extends the WebDAV Distributed Authoring 
       Protocol to enable clients to create new access paths to existing 
       resources.  This capability is useful for several reasons: 

       URIs of WebDAV-compliant resources are hierarchical and correspond 
       to a hierarchy of collections in resource space.  The WebDAV 
       Distributed Authoring Protocol makes it possible to organize these 
       resources into hierarchies, placing them into groupings, known as 
       collections, which are more easily browsed and manipulated than a 
       single flat collection.  However, hierarchies require 
       categorization decisions that locate resources at a single location 
       in the hierarchy, a drawback when a resource has multiple valid 
       categories. For example, in a hierarchy of vehicle descriptions 
       containing collections for cars and boats, a description of a 
       combination car/boat vehicle could belong in either collection. 
       Ideally, the description should be accessible from both. Allowing 
       clients to create new URIs that access the existing resource lets 
       them put that resource into multiple collections. 

       Hierarchies also make resource sharing more difficult, since 
       resources that have utility across many collections are still 
       forced into a single collection. For example, the mathematics 
       department at one university might create a collection of 
       information on fractals that contains bindings to some local 
       resources, but also provides access to some resources at other 
       universities.  For many reasons, it may be undesirable to make 
       physical copies of the shared resources on the local server: to 
       conserve disk space, to respect copyright constraints, or to make 
       any changes in the shared resources visible automatically. Being 
       able to create new access paths to existing resources in other 
       collections or even on other servers is useful for this sort of 
       case. 

       The BIND method defined here provides a mechanism for allowing 
       clients to create alternative access paths to existing WebDAV 
       resources. HTTP and WebDAV methods are able to work because there 
       are mappings between URIs and resources.  A method is addressed to 
       a URI, and the server follows the mapping from that URI to a 
       resource, applying the method to that resource.  Multiple URIs may 
       be mapped to the same resource, but until now there has been no way 
       for clients to create additional URIs mapped to existing resources.


       BIND lets clients associate a new URI with an existing WebDAV 
       resource, and this URI can then be used to submit requests to the 
       resource.  Since URIs of WebDAV resources are hierarchical, and 
       correspond to a hierarchy of collections in resource space, the 
       BIND method also has the effect of adding the resource to a 
       collection.  As new URIs are associated with the resource, it 
       appears in additional collections. 



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       A BIND request does not create a new resource, but simply makes 
       available a new URI for submitting requests to an existing 
       resource.  The new URI is indistinguishable from any other URI when 
       submitting a request to a resource.  Only one round trip is needed 
       to submit a request to the intended target.  Servers are required 
       to enforce the integrity of the relationships between the new URIs 
       and the resources associated with them.  Consequently, it may be 
       very costly for servers to support BIND requests that cross server 
       boundaries. 

       This specification is organized as follows.  Section 1.1 defines 
       terminology used in the rest of the specification, while Section 2 
       overviews bindings.  Section 3 specifies the BIND method, used to 
       create multiple bindings to the same resource.  Sections Error! 
       Reference source not found. defines the new properties needed to 
       support multiple bindings to the same resource. 


  1.1 Terminology 

       The terminology used here follows and extends that in the WebDAV 
       Distributed Authoring Protocol specification [RFC2518]. 

     URI Mapping 

       A relation between an absolute URI and a resource.  For an absolute 
       URI U and the resource it identifies R, the URI mapping can be 
       thought of as (U => R).  Since a resource can represent items that 
       are not network retrievable, as well as those that are, it is 
       possible for a resource to have zero, one, or many URI mappings. 
       Mapping a resource to an "http" scheme URL makes it possible to 
       submit HTTP protocol requests to the resource using the URL. 

     Path Segment 

       Informally, the characters found between slashes ("/") in a URI.  
       Formally, as defined in section 3.3 of [RFC2396]. 

     Binding 

       A relation between a single path segment (in a collection) and a 
       resource.  A binding is part of the state of a collection.  If two 
       different collections contain a binding between the same path 
       segment and the same resource, these are two distinct bindings.  So 
       for a collection C, a path segment S, and a resource R, the binding 
       can be thought of as C:(S -> R). Bindings create URI mappings, and 
       hence allow requests to be sent to a single resource from multiple 
       locations in a URI namespace.  For example, given a collection C 
       (accessible through the URI http://www.example.com/coll/), a path 
       segment S (equal to "foo.html"), and a resource R, then creating 
       the binding C: (S -> R) makes it possible to use the URI 
       http://www.example.com/coll/foo.html to access R. 



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     Collection 

       A resource that contains, as part of its state, a set of bindings 
       that identify internal member resources. 



















































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     Internal Member URI 

       The URI that identifies an internal member of a collection, and 
       that consists of the URI for the collection, followed by a slash 
       character ('/'), followed by the path segment of the binding for 
       that internal member. 


  1.2 Rationale for Distinguishing Bindings from URI Mappings 

       In [RFC2518], the state of a collection is defined as containing a 
       list of internal member URIs.  If there are multiple mappings to a 
       collection, then the state of the collection is different when you 
       refer to it via a different URI. This is undesirable, since ideally 
       a collection's membership should remain the same, independent of 
       which URI was used to reference it. 

       The notion of binding is introduced to separate the final segment 
       of a URI from its parent collection's contribution. This done, a 
       collection can be defined as containing a set of bindings, thus 
       permitting new mappings to a collection without modifying its 
       membership.  The authors of this specification anticipate and 
       recommend that future revisions of [RFC2518] will update the 
       definition of the state of a collection to correspond to the 
       definition in this document. 


  2  OVERVIEW OF BINDINGS 

       Bindings are part of the state of a collection. They define the 
       internal members of the collection, and the names of those internal 
       members. 

       Bindings are added and removed by a variety of existing HTTP 
       methods.  A method that creates a new resource, such as PUT, COPY, 
       and MKCOL, adds a binding.  A method that deletes a resource, such 
       as DELETE, removes a binding.  A method that moves a resource (e.g. 
       MOVE) both adds a binding (in the destination collection) and 
       removes a binding (in the source collection).  The BIND method 
       introduced here provides a mechanism for adding a second binding to 
       an existing resource.  There is no difference between an initial 
       binding added by PUT, COPY, or MKCOL, and additional bindings added 
       with BIND. 

       It would be very undesirable if one binding could be destroyed as a 
       side effect of operating on the resource through a different 
       binding.  In particular, the removal of one binding to a resource 
       (e.g. with a DELETE or a MOVE) MUST NOT disrupt another binding to 
       that resource, e.g. by turning that binding into a dangling path 
       segment.  The server MUST NOT reclaim system resources after 
       removing one binding, while other bindings to the resource remain.  
       In other words, the server MUST maintain the integrity of a 
       binding. 


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  2.1 Bindings to Collections 

       Bindings to collections can result in loops, which servers MUST 
       detect when processing "Depth: infinity" requests.  It is sometimes 
       possible to complete an operation in spite of the presence of a 
       loop.  However, the 506 (Loop Detected) status code is defined in 
       Section 5 for use in contexts where an operation is terminated 
       because a loop was encountered. 

       Creating a new binding to a collection makes each resource 
       associated with a binding in that collection accessible via a new 
       URI, and thus creates new URI mappings to those resources but no 
       new bindings. 

       For example, suppose a new binding CollY is created for collection 
       C1 in the figure below.  It immediately becomes possible to access 
       resource R1 using the URI /CollY/x.gif and to access resource R2 
       using the URI /CollY/y.jpg, but no new bindings for these child 
       resources were created.  This is because bindings are part of the 
       state of a collection, and associate a URI that is relative to that 
       collection with its target resource.  No change to the bindings in 
       Collection C1 is needed to make its children accessible using 
       /CollY/x.gif and /CollY/y.jpg. 

       +-------------------------+ 
       | Root Collection         | 
       | (properties)            | 
       |  bindings:              | 
       |  CollX          CollY   | 
       +-------------------------+ 
           |            /            
           |           /  
           |          /  
       +------------------+    
       | Collection C1    |    
       | (properties)     |    
       | bindings:        | 
       | x.gif     y.jpg  |    
       +------------------+    
           |          \                 
           |           \                 
           |            \                
       +-------------+   +-------------+ 
       | Resource R1 |   | Resource R2 | 
       +-------------+   +-------------+  
   

  2.2 URI Mappings Created by a new Binding 

       Suppose a binding from "Binding-Name" to resource R to be added to 
       a collection, C.  Then if C-MAP is the set of URI's that were 
       mapped to C before the BIND request, then for each URI "C-URI" in 
       C-MAP, the URI "C-URI/Binding-Name" is mapped to resource R 
       following the BIND request. 

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       For example, if a binding from "foo.html" to R is added to a 
       collection C, and if the following URI's are mapped to C: 

       http://www.example.com/A/1/ 
       http://example.com/A/one/ 
      
       then the following new mappings to R are introduced: 

       http://www.example.com/A/1/foo.html 
       http://example.com/A/one/foo.html 
      
       Note that if R is a collection, additional URI mappings are created 
       to the descendents of R.  Also, note that if a binding is made in 
       collection C to C itself (or to a parent of C), an infinite number 
       of mappings are introduced. 

       For example, if a binding from "myself" to C is then added to C, 
       the following infinite number of additional mappings to C are 
       introduced: 

       http://www.example.com/A/1/myself 
       http://www.example.com/A/1/myself/myself 
          ... 
      
       and the following infinite number of additional mappings to R are 
       introduced: 

       http://www.example.com/A/1/myself/foo.html 
       http://www.example.com/A/1/myself/myself/foo.html 
          ... 

  2.3 DELETE and Bindings 

       The DELETE method was originally defined in [RFC2616]. This section 
       redefines the behavior of DELETE in terms of bindings, an 
       abstraction not available when writing [RFC2616]. [RFC2616] states 
       that "the DELETE method requests that the origin server delete the 
       resource identified by the Request-URI."  Because [RFC2616] did not 
       distinguish between bindings and resources, the intent of its 
       definition of DELETE is unclear.  The definition presented here is 
       a clarification of the definition in [RFC2616]. 

       The DELETE method requests that the server remove the binding 
       between the resource identified by the Request-URI and the binding 
       name, the last path segment of the Request-URI. The binding MUST be 
       removed from its parent collection, identified by the Request-URI 
       minus its trailing slash (if present) and final segment.  

       Once a resource is unreachable by any URI mapping, the server MAY 
       reclaim system resources associated with that resource. If DELETE 
       removes a binding to a resource, but there remain URI mappings to 
       that resource, the server MUST NOT reclaim system resources 
       associated with the resource. 


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       Although [RFC2518] allows a DELETE to be a non-atomic operation, 
       the DELETE operation defined here is atomic.  In particular, a 
       DELETE on a hierarchy of resources is simply the removal of a 
       binding to the collection identified by the Request-URI, and so is 
       a single (and therefore atomic) operation.  

       Section 8.6.1 of [RFC2518] states that during DELETE processing, a 
       server "MUST remove any URI for the resource identified by the 
       Request-URI from collections which contain it as a member."  
       Servers that support bindings MUST NOT follow this requirement. 


  2.4 COPY and Bindings 

       As defined in Section 8.8 of [RFC2518], COPY causes the resource 
       identified by the Request-URI to be duplicated, and makes the new 
       resource accessible using the URI specified in the Destination 
       header.  Upon successful completion of a COPY, a new binding is 
       created between the last path segment of the Destination header, 
       and the destination resource. The new binding is added to its 
       parent collection, identified by the Destination header minus its 
       trailing slash (if present) and final segment. 

       The following figure shows an example: Suppose that a COPY is 
       issued to URI 3 for resource R (which is also mapped to URI 1 and 
       URI 2), with the Destination header set to URIX.  After successful 
       completion of the COPY operation, resource R is duplicated to 
       create resource R', and a new binding has been created which 
       creates at least the URI mapping between URIX and the new resource 
       (although other URI mappings may also have been created). 

       URI 1   URI 2    URI 3                           URIX 
          |       |        |                              | 
          |       |        |   <---- URI Mappings ---->   | 
          |       |        |                              | 
       +---------------------+                 +------------------------+ 
       |     Resource R      |                 |     Resource R'        | 
       +---------------------+                 +------------------------+ 
   
       It might be thought that a COPY request with "Depth: 0" on a 
       collection would duplicate its bindings, since bindings are part of 
       the collection's state.  This is not the case, however.  The 
       definition of Depth in [RFC2518] makes it clear that a "Depth: 0" 
       request does not apply to a collection's members.  Consequently, a 
       COPY with "Depth: 0" does not duplicate the bindings contained by 
       the collection. 


  2.5 MOVE and Bindings 

       The MOVE method has the effect of creating a new binding to a 
       resource (at the Destination), and removing an existing binding (at 
       the Request-URI). The name of the new binding is the last path 
       segment of the Destination header, and the new binding is added to 

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       its parent collection, identified by the Destination header minus 
       its trailing slash (if present) and final segment.   

       As an example, suppose that a MOVE is issued to URI 3 for resource 
       R below (which is also mapped to URI 1 and URI 2), with the 
       Destination header set to URIX.  After successful completion of the 
       MOVE operation, a new binding has been created which creates at 
       least the URI mapping between URIX and resource R (although other 
       URI mappings may also have been created).  The binding 
       corresponding to the final segment of URI 3 has been removed, which 
       also causes the URI mapping between URI 3 and R to be removed. 

       >> Before Request: 
        
        URI 1   URI 2    URI 3 
          |       |        |                                 
          |       |        |      <---- URI Mappings 
          |       |        | 
       +---------------------+                    
       |     Resource R      | 
       +---------------------+                    
        
       >> After Request: 
        
        URI 1   URI 2    URIX 
          |       |        |                                 
          |       |        |      <---- URI Mappings 
          |       |        | 
       +---------------------+                    
       |     Resource R      | 
       +---------------------+                    
   
       Although [RFC2518] allows a MOVE on a collection to be a non-atomic 
       operation, the MOVE operation defined here MUST be atomic.  Even 
       when the Request-URI identifies a collection, the MOVE operation 
       involves only removing one binding to that collection and adding 
       another.  There are no operations on bindings to any of its 
       children, so the case of MOVE on a collection is the same as the 
       case of MOVE on a non-collection resource.  Both are atomic. 


  2.5.1Additional MOVE Semantics 

     Additional Preconditions: 

       (DAV:cycle-allowed): If the request-URL identifies a collection, 
       and the parent of the Destination is that collection or is a member 
       of that collection,  the server MUST support cycles in the URL 
       namespace.  






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  2.6 Determining Whether Two Bindings Are to the Same Resource 

       It is useful to have some way of determining whether two bindings 
       are to the same resource.  Two resources might have identical 
       contents and properties, but not be the same resource (e.g. an 
       update to one resource does not affect the other resource). 

       The REQUIRED DAV:resource-id property defined in Section 3.1 is a 
       resource identifier, which MUST be unique across all resources for 
       all time.  If the values of DAV:resource-id returned by PROPFIND 
       requests through two bindings are identical, the client can be 
       assured that the two bindings are to the same resource. 

       The DAV:resource-id property is created, and its value assigned, 
       when the resource is created.  The value of DAV:resource-id MUST 
       NOT be changed.  Even after the resource is no longer accessible 
       through any URI, that value MUST NOT be reassigned to another 
       resource's DAV:resource-id property. 

       Any method that creates a new resource MUST assign a new, unique 
       value to its DAV:resource-id property.  For example, a PUT that 
       creates a new resource must assign a new, unique value to its 
       DAV:resource-id property.  A COPY, since it creates a new resource 
       at the Destination URI, must assign a new, unique value to its 
       DAV:resource-id property. 

       On the other hand, any method that affects an existing resource 
       MUST NOT change the value of its DAV:resource-id property.  For 
       example, a PUT that updates an existing resource must not change 
       the value of its DAV:resource-id property.  A MOVE, since it does 
       not create a new resource, but only changes the location of an 
       existing resource, must not change the value of its DAV:resource-id 
       property. 


  2.7 Discovering the Bindings to a Resource 

       An OPTIONAL DAV:parent-set property on a resource provides a list 
       of the bindings that associate a collection and a URI segment with 
       that resource.  If the DAV:parent-set property exists on a given 
       resource, it MUST contain a complete list of all bindings to that 
       resource that the client is authorized to see.  When deciding 
       whether to support the DAV:parent-set property, server implementers 
       / administrators should balance the benefits it provides against 
       the cost of maintaining the property and the security risks 
       enumerated in Sections 6.4 and 6.5. 


  3  PROPERTIES 

       The bind feature introduces the following properties for a 
       resource. 



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  3.1 DAV:resource-id Property 

       The DAV:resource-id property is a REQUIRED property that enables 
       clients to determine whether two bindings are to the same resource.  
       The value of DAV:resource-id is a URI, and may use any registered 
       URI scheme that guarantees the uniqueness of the value across all 
       resources for all time (e.g. the opaquelocktoken: scheme defined in 
       [RFC2518]). 

       <!ELEMENT resource-id (href)> 

  3.2 DAV:parent-set Property 

       The DAV:parent-set property is an OPTIONAL property that enables 
       clients to discover what collections contain a binding to this 
       resource (i.e. what collections have that resource as an internal 
       member).  It contains an of href/segment pair for each collection 
       that has a binding to the resource.  The href identifies the 
       collection, and the segment identifies the binding name of that 
       resource in that collection. 

       A given collection MUST appear only once in the DAV:parent-set for 
       any given binding, even if there are multiple URI mappings to that 
       collection.  For example, if collection C1 is mapped to both /CollX 
       and /CollY, and C1 contains a binding named "x.gif" to a resource 
       R1, then either [/CollX, x.gif] or [/CollY, y.gif] can appear in 
       the DAV:parent-set of R1, but not both.  But if C1 also had a 
       binding named "y.gif" to R1, then there would be two entries for C1 
       in the DAV:binding-set of R1 (i.e. either both [/CollX, x.gif] and 
       [/CollX, y.gif] or alternatively, both [/CollY, x.gif] and [/CollY, 
       y.gif]). 

       <!ELEMENT parent-set (parent)*> 
       <!ELEMENT parent (href, segment)> 
       <!ELEMENT segment (#PCDATA)> 
       PCDATA value: segment, as defined in section 3.3 of [RFC2396] 

  4  BIND METHOD 

       The BIND method modifies the collection identified by the Request-
       URI, by adding a new binding from the segment specified in the BIND 
       body to the resource identified in the BIND body. 

       If a server cannot guarantee the integrity of the binding, the BIND 
       request MUST fail.  Note that it is especially difficult to 
       maintain the integrity of cross-server bindings.  Unless the server 
       where the resource resides knows about all bindings on all servers 
       to that resource, it may unwittingly destroy the resource or make 
       it inaccessible without notifying another server that manages a 
       binding to the resource.  For example, if server A permits creation 
       of a binding to a resource on server B, server A must notify server 
       B about its binding and must have an agreement with B that B will 
       not destroy the resource while A's binding exists.  Otherwise 
       server B may receive a DELETE request that it thinks removes the 

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       last binding to the resource and destroy the resource while A's 
       binding still exists. Status code 507 (Cross-server Binding 
       Forbidden) is defined in Section 5.1 for cases where servers fail 
       cross-server BIND requests because they cannot guarantee the 
       integrity of cross-server bindings. 

       By default, if there already is a binding for the specified segment 
       in the collection, the new binding replaces the existing binding. 
       This default binding replacement behavior can be overridden using 
       the Overwrite header defined in Section 9.6 of [RFC2518].  

     Marshalling: 

       The request MAY include an Overwrite header. 

       The request body MUST be a DAV:bind XML element. 

       <!ELEMENT bind ANY> 
       <!ELEMENT bind (segment, href)> 
        
       If the request succeeds, the server MUST return 201 (Created) when 
       a new binding was created and 204 (No Content) when an existing 
       binding was replaced. 

       If a response body for a successful request is included, it MUST be 
       a DAV:bind-response XML element.  Note that this document does not 
       define any elements for the BIND response body, but the DAV:bind-
       response element is defined to ensure interoperability between 
       future extensions that do define elements for the BIND response 
       body. 

       <!ELEMENT bind-response ANY> 
     Preconditions: 

       (DAV:bind-into-collection): The Request-URL MUST identify a 
       collection. 

       (DAV:bind-source-exists): The DAV:href element MUST identify a 
       resource. 

       (DAV:binding-allowed): The resource identified by the DAV:href 
       supports multiple bindings to it. 

       (DAV:cross-server-binding): If the resource identified by the 
       DAV:href element in the request body is on another server from the 
       collection identified by the request-URL, the server MUST support 
       cross-server bindings. 

       (DAV:name-allowed): The name specified by the DAV:segment is 
       available for use as a new binding name. 

       (DAV:can-overwrite): If the collection already contains a binding 
       with the specified path segment, and if an Overwrite header is 
       included, the value of the Overwrite header MUST be "T". 

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       (DAV:cycle-allowed): If the DAV:href element identifies a 
       collection, and if the request-URL identifies a collection that is 
       a member of that collection, the server MUST support cycles in the 
       URL namespace.  

     Postconditions: 

       (DAV:new-binding): The collection MUST have a binding that maps the 
       segment specified in the DAV:segment element in the request body, 
       to the resource identified by the DAV:href element in the request 
       body. 


  4.1 Example: BIND  

       >> Request: 
        
       BIND /coll HTTP/1.1 
       Host: www.example.com 
       Content-Type: text/xml; charset="utf-8" 
       Content-Length: xxx 
        
       <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> 
       <D:bind xmlns:D="DAV:"> 
          <D:segment>bar.html</D:segment> 
          <D:href>http://www.example.com/coll/foo.html</D:href> 
       </D:bind> 
        
       >> Response: 
        
       HTTP/1.1 200 OK 
      
       The server added a new binding to the collection, 
       "http://www.example.com/coll", associating "bar.html" with the 
       resource identified by the URL 
       "http://www.example.com/coll/foo.html".  Clients can now use the 
       URL "http://www.example.com/coll/bar.html", to submit requests to 
       that resource. 


  5  ADDITIONAL STATUS CODES 


  5.1 506 Loop Detected 

       The 506 (Loop Detected) status code indicates that the server 
       terminated an operation because it encountered an infinite loop 
       while processing a request with "Depth: infinity".  

       When this status code is the top-level status code for the 
       operation, it indicates that the entire operation failed.   




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       When this status code occurs inside a multi-status response, it 
       indicates only that a loop is being terminated, but does not 
       indicate failure of the operation as a whole. 

       For example, consider a PROPFIND request on /Coll (bound to 
       collection C), where the members of  /Coll are /Coll/Foo (bound to 
       resource R) and /Coll/Bar (bound to collection C). 

       >> Request: 
        
       PROPFIND /Coll/ HTTP/1.1 
       Host: www.example.com 
       Depth: infinity 
       Content-Type: text/xml; charset="utf-8" 
       Content-Length: xxx 
        
       <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> 
       <D:propfind xmlns:D="DAV:"> 
          <D:prop> <D:displayname/> </D:prop> 
       </D:propfind> 
        
       >> Response: 
        
       HTTP/1.1 207 Multi-Status 
       Content-Type: text/xml; charset="utf-8" 
       Content-Length: xxx 
        
       <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> 
       <D:multistatus xmlns:D="DAV:"> 
          <D:response> 
             <D:href>http://www.example.com/Coll/</D:href> 
             <D:propstat> 
                <D:prop> 
                   <D:displayname>Loop Demo</D:displayname> 
                </D:prop> 
                <D:status>HTTP/1.1 200 OK</D:status> 
             </D:propstat> 
          </D:response> 
          <D:response> 
             <D:href>http://www.example.com/Coll/Foo</D:href> 
             <D:propstat> 
                <D:prop> 
                   <D:displayname>Bird Inventory</D:displayname> 
                </D:prop> 
                <D:status>HTTP/1.1 200 OK</D:status> 
             </D:propstat> 
          </D:response> 
          <D:response> 
             <D:href>http://www.example.com/Coll/Bar</D:href> 
             <D:status>HTTP/1.1 506 Loop Detected</D:status> 
          </D:response> 
       </D:multistatus> 



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  6  SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS 

       This section is provided to make WebDAV applications aware of the 
       security implications of this protocol.  

       All of the security considerations of HTTP/1.1 and the WebDAV 
       Distributed Authoring Protocol specification also apply to this 
       protocol specification.  In addition, bindings introduce several 
       new security concerns and increase the risk of some existing 
       threats.  These issues are detailed below. 


  6.1 Privacy Concerns 

       In a context where cross-server bindings are supported, creating 
       bindings on a trusted server may make it possible for a hostile 
       agent to induce users to send private information to a target on a 
       different server. 


  6.2 Redirect Loops 

       Although redirect loops were already possible in HTTP 1.1, the 
       introduction of the BIND method creates a new avenue for clients to 
       create loops accidentally or maliciously.  If the binding and its 
       target are on the same server, the server may be able to detect 
       BIND requests that would create loops.  Servers are required to 
       detect loops that are caused by bindings to collections during the 
       processing of any requests with "Depth: infinity". 


  6.3 Bindings, and Denial of Service 

       Denial of service attacks were already possible by posting URLs 
       that were intended for limited use at heavily used Web sites.  The 
       introduction of BIND creates a new avenue for similar denial of 
       service attacks.  If cross-server bindings are supported, clients 
       can now create bindings at heavily used sites to target locations 
       that were not designed for heavy usage. 


  6.4 Private Locations May Be Revealed 

       If the DAV:parent-set property is maintained on a resource, the 
       owners of the bindings risk revealing private locations.  The 
       directory structures where bindings are located are available to 
       anyone who has access to the DAV:parent-set property on the 
       resource.  Moving a binding may reveal its new location to anyone 
       with access to DAV:parent-set on its resource. 






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  6.5 DAV:parent-set and Denial of Service 

       If the server maintains the DAV:parent-set property in response to 
       bindings created in other administrative domains, it is exposed to 
       hostile attempts to make it devote resources to adding bindings to 
       the list. 


  7  INTERNATIONALIZATION CONSIDERATIONS 

       All internationalization considerations mentioned in [RFC2518] also 
       apply to this document. 


  8  IANA CONSIDERATIONS 

       All IANA considerations mentioned in [RFC2518] also apply to this 
       document. 


  9  INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY 

       The following notice is copied from RFC 2026, Section 10.4, and 
       describes the position of the IETF concerning intellectual property 
       claims made against this document. 

       The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any 
       intellectual property or other rights that might be claimed to 
       pertain to the implementation or use other technology described in 
       this document or the extent to which any license under such rights 
       might or might not be available; neither does it represent that it 
       has made any effort to identify any such rights.  Information on 
       the procedures of the IETF with respect to rights in standards-
       track and standards-related documentation can be found in BCP-11.  
       Copies of claims of rights made available for publication and any 
       assurances of licenses to be made available, or the result of an 
       attempt made to obtain a general license or permission for the use 
       of such proprietary rights by implementers or users of this 
       specification can be obtained from the IETF Secretariat. 

       The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its attention any 
       copyrights, patents or patent applications, or other proprietary 
       rights that may cover technology that may be required to practice 
       this standard.  Please address the information to the IETF 
       Executive Director. 


  10 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 

       This draft is the collaborative product of the authors and Tyson 
       Chihaya, Jim Davis, and Chuck Fay.  This draft has benefited from 
       thoughtful discussion by Jim Amsden, Peter Carlson, Steve Carter, 
       Ken Coar, Ellis Cohen, Dan Connolly, Bruce Cragun, Spencer Dawkins, 
       Mark Day, Rajiv Dulepet, David Durand, Roy Fielding, Yaron Goland, 

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       Fred Hitt, Alex Hopmann, James Hunt, Marcus Jager, Chris Kaler, 
       Manoj Kasichainula, Rohit Khare, Daniel LaLiberte, Steve Martin, 
       Larry Masinter, Jeff McAffer, Surendra Koduru Reddy, Max Rible, Sam 
       Ruby, Bradley Sergeant, Nick Shelness, John Stracke, John Tigue, 
       John Turner, Kevin Wiggen, and other members of the WebDAV working 
       group. 


  11 REFERENCES 

       [RFC2026] S.Bradner, "The Internet Standards Process", RFC 2026, 
       October 1996. 

       [RFC2119] S.Bradner, "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate 
       Requirement Levels", RFC 2119, March 1997. 

       [RFC2277] H.Alvestrand, "IETF Policy on Character Sets and 
       Languages." RFC 2277,  January 1998. 

       [RFC2396] T. Berners-Lee, R. Fielding, L. Masinter, "Uniform 
       Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax." RFC 2396, August 1998. 

       [RFC2518] Y.Goland, E.Whitehead, A.Faizi, S.R.Carter, D.Jensen, 
       "HTTP Extensions for Distributed Authoring - WEBDAV", RFC 2518, 
       February 1999. 

       [RFC2616] R.Fielding, J.Gettys, J.C.Mogul, H.Frystyk, L.Masinter, 
       P.Leach, and T.Berners-Lee, "Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- 
       HTTP/1.1", RFC 2616, June 1999.  

       [XML] T. Bray, J. Paoli, C.M. Sperberg-McQueen, "Extensible Markup 
       Language (XML) 1.0 (Second Edition)"  W3C Recommendation 6 October 
       2000. http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-xml-20001006.  


  12 AUTHORS' ADDRESSES 

       Geoffrey Clemm 
       Rational Software Corporation 
       20 Maguire Road 
       Lexington, MA 02173-3104 
       Email: geoffrey.clemm@rational.com 
        
       Jason Crawford 
       IBM Research 
       P.O. Box 704 
       Yorktown Heights, NY 10598 
       Email: ccjason@us.ibm.com 
        
       Julian F. Reschke 
       greenbytes GmbH 
       Salzmannstrasse 152 
       Muenster, NW 48159, Germany 
       Email: julian.reschke@greenbytes.de 

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       Judy Slein 
       Xerox Corporation 
       800 Phillips Road, 105-50C 
       Webster, NY 14580 
       Email: jslein@crt.xerox.com 
        
       Jim Whitehead 
       UC Santa Cruz, Dept. of Computer Science 
       1156 High Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95064 
       Email: ejw@cse.ucsc.edu 
        











































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