DAV-E

In the navigation area (topmost part of the screen) you find the button on the left side allowing you to go to the previous page and on the right side is the button refreshing the current information. In the toolbar area (placed at the bottom of the screen) there are some buttons performing the following actions when pressed:

• shows a manual screen.
• displays the properties of the current collection.
• creates a new folder.
• uploads a pictures.
• creates a new or modifies an existing text file.
• stores the current resource (and all children) in the cache.
• deletes the current resource.
• displays the content of the current file.
• renames the current resource.
• sends a link to the current resource via eMail.

In the login screen you have to enter all data which is necessary to establish a connection to a WebDAV server. This is at least the URL and (if necessary) a username and a password. There are three switches:

• 
  If set all files are listed. If not all files will a leading "." or with a set DAV:ishidden property are filtered.
• 
  If set the password (if any) will be saved internally. If you select the used URL and username from the LRU list the password line will be automatically filled out.
• 
  If a connection shall be established using the encrypted and safe variant of HTTP named HTTPS the server has to identify using a certificate. Part of this certificate is an expiration date and a trust chain identifying that you're talking with the desired server. Sometimes the expiration date is expired and therefore the certificate invalid. If the root of the trust chain is not a trusted (eg. self signed) root certificate in your device or the name of the server does not fit to the name stored in the trust chain the certificate is invalid too. Without accepting this "invalid" certificate no connection can be established.

DAV-E can use an internal persistent database cache to increase performance. To do so you have to enable the cache and set it to a suitable size. This is done in the Settings of the iPhone/iPod touch selecting the DAV-E section.

As soon as the cache is enabled all responses sent by the server are stored into the local database. If the limit of the database is reached the oldest entries are automatically removed. You can set the database quota fitting you needs. If you have plenty of memory left on your device there is no reason to be stingy with the database size.

When connecting to a server you have to define the maximum age of cache entries to be used. If you choose live all displayed information is retrieved from the WebDAV server and the cache is only used to backup the data locally for further use. If you choose infinite all informations is taken out of the cache if present. You can use this mode for a complete off-line use of the repository browsing and displaying formerly visited resources.
As soon as you modify a resource the resource itself and the parent collection is invalidated. You can refresh the displayed informations by pressing the refresh button in the navigation bar which always leads to a new request against the server. As mentioned before the cache is automatically filled as soon as activated. All visited resources are stored into the cache. If you want to download a complete subtree of your repository at once you can press the button. This will determine all affected resources and calculate the needed space. As soon as this is done you can download all content with a single button press. Beware: This might take a reasonable time but you can stop the download at any time. Initially you see a list of resources sorted by their display name. Collections (indicated by a ) appear on top of regular files. Each resource may have some extra icons indicating the current state in the repository:

• if the resource is under version control and checked in.
• if the resource is under version control and checked out.
• if the resource is locked.

To display the properties of any resource just press the button. If you tap a line the following action will be performed:

• the contents of a collection is listed, or
• the content of a file is displayed (indicated by a background image suggesting the content type in the middle of the line), or
• the properties of a file are displayed.

If the plain resource has a "known" content type or filename extension a background image is shown:

• for PDF files
• for HTML files
• for text files
• for graphic files
• for audio files
• for video files
• for office and iWork files

If the server offers search ability the list of resources starts with a search field. The lookup starts with the current collection and scans all children with an infinite depth. Usually the resources are returned where a part of the display name matches the entered criteria. Some servers analyze the content (and/or the properties) of the resources too. Due to the fact that the search is server dependent DAV-E can not garantee a specific result or performance. Properties are grouped by their namespace. This namespace is displayed in a section header, followed by each property in a separate line, containing its name and value. Tapping on a line will reveal the complete entry if it was truncated in order to fit. Audio files are streamed directly from the server. This leads to an immediate playback. As soon as an audio file is completely downloaded its stored in the cache automatically. During playback an animated sound level graph for each channel is painted. You can change the volume setting, pause and resume and start the playback from the beginning. Video files are streamed with the built-in Quicktime player. The number of supported formats is restricted. Unlike audio streaming the videos are not automatically stored in the cache as soon as completely streamed. If you want to store a video in the local database for further offline usage you have to download it manually by pressing the button when displaying the properties of the video file. The content of many file formats can be displayed. Standard iPhone/iPod touch UI components and controls are used so that the usage of the content screens should be intuitive. The iPhone/iPod touch is a mobile device with limitations. It wasn't designed to be a notebook replacement. Therefore applications must live with restrictions. The display of content bigger than 1MB or so may lead to internal memory warnings. DAV-E handles this warnings and tries to free as much memory as possible. But it may happen that the operating system terminates memory consuming applications without any user information. So please try to avoid displaying big content. If the content of a collection or the properties of a text file are displayed you can press the button to create or modify an existing text file. The text size can be changed by zooming in and out. If the properties are displayed you can press the button to send a HTTP link pointing to the current resource via email. Please keep in mind that DAV-E will terminate and the mail application be started after a confirmation dialog.