URLs for objects in workspaces

You may create and manage collections of interrelated documents (HTML documents, .gif and .jpeg files, audio and video files, etc.) in BSCW using URLs for objects in workspaces. You may share them with other members of a workspace or make them public for anonymous access via the Internet (see 4.5.1).

References to BSCW objects may also be contained in notes, in the description of an object and in various other text fields.

•      If you want to create a reference to an object that is contained in another workspace on the same server, make sure that the members of your workspace are allowed to access that object.

•      If you want to create a reference to an object on another server, make sure that the object has been made public, i.e. that the user can access it anonymously.

To create a reference, you need the URL of the object. This URL can be specified in two different ways:

•      in the BSCW internal address format or

•      through the path in a directory tree.

Each of these formats has specific advantages:

BSCW internal numeric addresses are short and do not change when the object is moved to another folder or when a folder is renamed. They may be used as entry points to a set of documents linked by references from outside a BSCW server.

On the other hand, if you use the common relative pathnames, you can keep a set of documents linked by references portable. For example, you can archive them or move them to another server or to another location in the folder hierarchy, and the references will still work - provided that you don't delete or rename any documents from the set.