HTTP

Introduction

The HTTP service provides access to filesystems using the HTTP and HTTPS protocols and the HTTP extension WebDAV (Web based Distributed Authoring and Versioning). This allows clients to access shared filesystems through a web browser, or as a local filesystem if their client software supports it. The URL to access these HTTP and HTTPS shares have the following formats respectively:

http://hostname/shares/mountpoint/share_name

https://hostname/shares/mountpoint/share_name

The HTTPS server uses a self-signed security certificate.

Properties

Changing services properties is documented in the BUI and CLI sections of services.

Authentication and Access Control

If the "Require client login" option is enabled, then the appliance will deny access to clients that do not supply valid authentication credentials for a local user, a NIS user, or an LDAP user. Active Directory authentication is not supported.

Only basic HTTP authentication is supported. Note that unless HTTPS is being used, this transmits the username and password unencrypted, which may not be appropriate for all environments.

Normally, authenticated users have the same permissions with HTTP that they would have with NFS or FTP. Files and directories created by an authenticated user will be owned by that user, as viewed by other protocols. Privileged users (those having a uid less than 100) will be treated as "nobody" for the purposes of access control. Files created by privileged users will be owned by "nobody".

If the "Require client login" option is disabled, then the appliance will not try to authenticate clients (even if they do supply credentials). Newly created files are owned by "nobody", and all users are treated as "nobody" for the purposes of access control.

Regardless of authentication, no permissions are masked from created files and directories. Created files have Unix permissions 666 (readable and writable by everyone), and created directories have Unix permissions 777 (readable, writable, and executable by everyone).

Logs

To view service logs, refer to the Logs section from Services.

Tasks

HTTP Tasks

Allowing HTTP access to a share

1. Go to Configuration->Services
2. Check that the HTTP service is enabled and online. If not, enable the service.
3. Select or add a share in the Shares screen.
4. Go to the "Protocols" section, and check that HTTP access is enabled. This is also where the mode of access (read/read+write) can be set.