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Goober
Asked: 2009-08-28 05:18:41 +0800 CST

Turn a Directory on a Server into an accessible URL?

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Currently I have a networked server. I want to be able to have full access to a directory on that server from any computer on the network using a URL (in order to add files to it via source control etc).

From what I have read, the directory needs to be set up on a specific port. So for example the URL for the directory would be:

MyServer:80/CodeRepository/

However I am not very versed in this sort of thing and my knowledge is purely development based. How would I go about configuring this?

Help greatly appreciated, thank you.

windows-server-2008 remote-access

5 Answers

  1. When you say "fully accessible" do you mean as in a read-only web page/site or like a network drive where people can browse the contents and make changes or create new files there? It almost sounds like you need to create 2 things:

    • Create a shared folder and assign permissions to it (i.e. one user or group has full access, another user or group has read only)
    • Add the folder to the machine's default website as a virtual directory.

    This way, people can access the files as a network drive via \servername\sharename but they can see them as a website via http://servername/virtualdirectoryname

    Here is a tutorial for setting up Git on a Windows 2008 server: http://www.shannoncornish.com/blog/2009/04/git-server-windows-2008/

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  2. Try the following:

    • Set it up as a standard shared folder and confirm access to it via a UNC path ("\\server\share").
    • Next try accessing it using file://, i.e. file://server/share
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  3. You need for this a Web server in order to share the content over the HTTP protocol. If you use WS 2008 you can use IIS and define your directory as the webserver root directory (or use another one and create a shortcut to it) or also Apache here is a tutorial : http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/29/installing-iis-70-on-windows-server-2008/

    The thing about port is pointless here, you can tell to your server to listen on another port (that's usually the 80 for HTTP and 443 for HTTPS). Then you have two ways to access it : the way I don't like : access directly using the IP of the server : http://192.168.X.X/my_directory and the best way IMAO : a DNS record if you have a DNS server you should create a A record which designates this server. You can under WS2008 install the component "DNS Server" and add a zone plus a record A (for IPV4) here is a good tutorial : http://www.zdnetasia.com/techguide/windows/0,39044904,62040433,00.htm

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  4. If you have a web server, you can add this directory as an ftp virtual directory with all permissions. You can then just use the remote file explorer to explore "ftp://user:password@ftpserver/directory", and this gives you full control over the directory as if it was local.

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  5. You can do this by a public IP and any web application server.

    Download and install tomcat. Tomcat root folder will have a webapps directory, copy your folder in webapps. Start the server from tomcat/bin/startup.bat By default it will start on 8080 port number, you can change it from tomcat/config folder. Access you folder using: public-ip:8080/folder-name

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