An Application for WebDAV-based Authoring of Databases - WebDAD

We propose a new approach to accessing databases through the Web that is based on the WebDAV protocol (Web−based Distributed Authoring and Versioning). This paper introduces an extensible framework for WebDAV−based authoring of databases, whether relational or object−oriented, called WebDAD. WebDAD is a mapping of SQL database operations onto an HTTP URL namespace, and WebDAV protocol operations. This is the first peer−reviewed presentation on mapping SQL to WebDAV, and provides an insight into the similarities and differences between the WebDAV and SQL database approaches for managing data. The WebDAV protocol has been chosen as a foundation for WebDAD, since it is the first protocol for distributed authoring. Also, WebDAV advantages such as metadata and access control make it a better candidate of being the layout protocol for database transactions rather than HTTP.