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Q1 |
What are Web Folders and what's so good about
them? |
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A1 |
Web Folders are Microsoft's implementation of
the Internet standard called WebDAV, which is an extension of the HTTP protocol.
WebDAV
stands for Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning.
If that didn't help, try this:-
A Web Folder makes files stored on a remote web server appear as
if they are stored on your local PC or office server allowing
you to perform many of the same operations on them as if they
were stored locally, such as: edit, copy, move, delete, open and create a sub-folder.
Standard web-sites only allow you to download files while Web
Folders allow you to write to the web-site to add, delete or
change files using the familiar "Windows Explorer" interface.
The main advantages of Web Folders are:-
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They can be accessed from any computer with an Internet
connection so you can work with them wherever you are.
In
effect they follow you around without you having to do
anything but are still stored in a safe place. |
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The HTTPS protocol is used to access your files which
uses strong encryption and works through the majority of
firewalls.
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Disadvantages over locally stored files:-
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If the files are too big or you Internet
connection speed is too slow they can take a long time to open and save. |
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You need to have an Internet connection to access your files. |
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Q2 |
What are FreeDocs? |
A2 |
FreeDocs are another way, in addition to Web
Folders, of storing your files on-line.
If you rent an
Exchange mailbox from us you will find that, with Outlook open,
but not full-screen so that you can see part of your Desktop
behind, if you drag and drop a file from, say, your Desktop to an
Outlook mail folder it will copy the file into that folder.
Not as an attachment but as an actual file with the correct icon sat
in there among all the emails.
We didn't invent this, Outlook and Exchange have had this capability for years.
FreeDocs isn't as flexible as Web Folders but can be very
convenient as it saves you having to leave Outlook to work with files.
FreeDocs Facts
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You can't forward a FreeDoc to someone like you can a normal
email.
To do this you would have to drag it to the Desktop and
then attach it to a new email. |
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A FreeDoc can be stored in a Public Folder where multiple
users can access it. |
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FreeDocs can be opened in Outlook
Web Access and any changes you make can be saved to your local
hard drive but cannot be saved back to the mailbox folder. |
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FreeDocs can be opened in Outlook Express and any
changes you make can be saved to your local hard drive but
cannot be saved back to the mailbox folder |
Advantages |
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You can double-click a FreeDoc and it will open in the
correct program, for example a spreadsheet file will open in Excel and,
when you click Save, any changes to the file will be saved back into Outlook. |
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When you access Exchange in cached mode, a backup copy of
your FreeDocs will be kept on the Exchange server and every PC
you have Outlook setup on.
This ensures that your documents are
safe from a disaster on the Exchange server and, if you make
edits to a file which you later regret, there will be an old
copy of the file on another PC on which you use Outlook that's currently turned off.
This advantage can also be viewed as a
security problem because your FreeDocs files, stored locally in these
caches, could be accessed by other people. |
Disadvantages |
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The encoding system used for FreeDocs in Exchange is
inefficient, a 20kb file may require 25kb of storage so it's like
the opposite of a ZIP file. |
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Most emails take up very little storage space while most
other file types tend to be bigger.
The largest file you can
store as a FreeDoc depends on the maximum email size limit set
on Exchange which is typically between 10mb and 20mb - with Arrowmail servers, the limit
is 25mb.
If you store a lot of FreeDoc files in Outlook, their storage
requirement can be several times larger than that required for
just your email and this can slow down the operation of your email in general. |
FreeDocs is enabled by default on all our Exchange mailboxes
but it's best to use it sparingly.
Outlook with Exchange is a
fantastic solution for accessing your email conveniently from any location.
FreeDocs is not the same fantastic solution for accessing all your files.
There is currently no really good solution which
handles the problems of large files sizes, slow or unreliable
Internet speeds and security.
Web Folders are also affected by these problems.
USB Flash drives, portable hard drives, DVDs, Web Folders and FreeDocs can all help
to keep your files stored safely and make then readily accessible.
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Q3 |
What is a Mapped Drive? |
A3 |
In general, the term means a remote storage
location that appears on your PC as a drive letter so that it is
pretending to be a local hard drive.
The reasons for doing this are:-
1 - |
If users are familiar with finding, creating and moving
files on a PC's hard drive they should have no
difficulties working with a remote storage location if it behaves just like
an additional hard drive. |
2 - |
Any program that can work with files on a PC's hard
drive should be able to work with files in a mapped drive
without needing to be "network aware".
Outlook Express is
an example of a program that has been specifically crippled in this area
so that you can't choose to locate your email store on a mapped drive.
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What we mean by a Mapped Drive is to represent
your Arrowmail on-line storage as a drive letter on your PC.
Although Web Folders work pretty well, there are some operations
that don't work.
To map a Web Folder as a local drive
requires an extra program to be installed on your PC, so it's not suitable
for accessing your on-line storage from every location - such as
in an Internet Cafe - but I personally find it more convenient
to use a Mapped Drive on PCs I use regularly.
A Mapped Drive will only work on a PC and not on a
Smartphone.
There's more information about setting up a Mapped Drive
here.
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Q4 |
Can I access Web Folders from a Smartphone? |
A4 |
Yes and no.
Windows Mobile 5 and 6 don't support
the WebDAV protocol and so cannot display a Web Folder as a
standard Windows Explorer folder like you can on a PC.
However, all Web Folders can be opened in Internet Explorer as a
standard web-page where the files in the Web Folder can be
downloaded to the mobile device, but there is no ability to
write new or changed files back to the Web Folder.
All our Web Folders are FTP-enabled so, if you have a mobile
version of an FTP client and understand how to work FTP, you can upload files
back to the Web Folders.
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Q5 |
Can I access FreeDocs from a Smartphone? |
A5 |
No.
In Mobile Outlook on a Smartphone, the folder
containing FreeDocs will be visible but the FreeDocs themselves
will not, and it's nothing to do with the "maximum
attachment size" setting on the Smartphone.
A FreeDoc,
which is really a dummy email with a
file attachment, is just something that Mobile Outlook doesn't understand.
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Q6 |
I put a file in the Public folder in my
on-line storage and I emailed a link to a customer but, when they clicked
on the link, they got a username and password prompt and couldn't download the file.
Why did this happen? |
A6 |
Chances are that you moved
instead of copied the file to the Public folder from elsewhere in your on-line storage.
Moving really means copying and then deleting the original
file, however, when you move a file within the same drive, nothing gets copied or deleted.
Instead, the drive's "table of contents" is edited to change the folder where the file is located.
Files and folders are a metaphor, a layer of abstraction from
the underlying magnetic storage media so a quick fiddle with the
hidden mechanism of this metaphor can magic huge files from one location to another in an instant.
A great disk optimising technique with no drawbacks on FAT32
drives where files don't have security permissions.
On NTFS formatted drives, like our server's, moving a file
this way means, because the file itself isn't altered in any way, the moved file
retains its original security
permissions.
When a file is copied or moved from another drive
(different table of contents) the file contents really are copied, and so inherit the file permissions of the destination folder.
This is just how Windows works, there's nothing you can do about it.
When NTFS drives were invented, with Windows NT, someone had to
choose between optimising file move operations and a file permission gotcha.
Did they make the right choice?
The Public folder in your on-line storage has, by design, an
extra permissions entry which the private folders don't: anonymous internet
users have the Read and Read/Execute permissions.
This is the permission that would have allowed your customer to download the file.
When the file was in the private part of your on-line storage
it didn't have this permission and moving it to the Public
folder didn't change it's permissions.
Copying the file, or moving it from your PC's desktop, would have given it this permission.
To solve the problem, move the file back to the private area of your on-line storage, copy it to the
Public folder, and then delete the source file if appropriate.
Web Folders, mapped drives or FTP access don't allow you to
see, or directly change the security permissions of a file stored on our server.
When a file is moved within the same drive it's compressed or
encrypted status is also retained.
If a moved file
accidentally retains its encrypted status in a new location
this is the biggest gotcha of the Windows File System as it can render the file
unrecoverable, but don't worry, Arrowmail's on-line storage doesn't use NTFS encryption.
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Q7 |
What happens if 2 people try to edit the same file, stored in a Web Folder, at the same time? |
A7 |
If you use your on-line storage just for your
own files then you're not going to run into this problem of
editing one document from 2 places at once. (I suppose you could
leave a document open and unsaved on one PC and then go and access it on another.)
With a document in an on-line storage location that several
people have access to, you can easily get the situation where,
unknown to each other, 2 people are trying to edit the same document simultaneously.
If no system is in place to arbitrate, then the last person
to save the document wins and all the changes the other person made to the document are lost.
The way many networking systems deal with this problem is to use "edit locks".
The WebDAV protocol ,which is used by Arrowmail's
implementation of Web Folders and Mapped Drives, uses edit locks
while FTP, an alternative way to access your on-line storage,
does not
Interestingly, if someone opens a document via a Web
Folder, the edit lock generated prevents changes being made to the same file opened using FTP.
How Edit Locks Work with Web Folders and Mapped Drives
The first person who attempts to open a file automatically
gets full editing privileges, without any warning message, and
so can save changes to the file at any time.
The second and
subsequent people who attempt to open the same file receive the following message:-
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Read Only is a little misleading as you can make
changes to the copy you've opened and save it to a different
location - you just can't save it back to the original location. Letting you know who's currently got editing
rights and offering to notify you when the file becomes available for
editing are useful and, as long as you stay connected, the
following message will eventually popup:-
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Q8 |
How come you don't offer Microsoft SharePoint
Server as a way of sharing documents in on-line storage? |
A8 |
We probably will in the near future.
Representing files stored on-line as Web Folders and
especially as Mapped Drives are concepts easily understood by the
majority of ordinary computer users, so we need to be careful not to overcomplicate things.
We're still trying to get the message across about how great fully synchronised email is.
"SharePoint is under-utilized in Office", said Bill Gates so perhaps we'll wait a until it's more
widely known and understood.
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Q9 |
How come the WebStats emails you send me don't display
properly in Outlook? |
A9 |
These emails contain scripts for formatting
the appearance of the email and these may be blocked from
operating by Outlook's security settings.
Outlook is
cautious about this as scripts have been used
to spread viruses and spyware.
To make the WebStats email display correctly:-
Open the email and click:-
View - View in Internet Zone
and click: OK to the warning message and, perhaps, select:-
Please do not show me this dialog again
To enable all future WebStats emails to display correctly, with a Webstats email selected in the Inbox go to:-
Actions - Junk E-mail - Add Sender to Safe Senders List
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You can add, remove or edit entries on your Safe Senders List in Outlook by going to :-
Tools - Options… - Preferences - Junk E-mail… - Safe Senders
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