WebDAV authentication for shared review from Acrobat X Pro on Mac

[David Hollis]

Hi,

I can access the WebDAV server from the Mac desktop with the username and password.

I am using Acrobat X Pro on Apple Mac.

Click on 'Send for Shared Review', and the dialog box opens.

The only option is 'Automatically collect ... internal server'

Click 'Next'

Choose 'Web server folder', and enter the server URL.

Click 'Next'.

A message box opens up with: 'The Shared Folder Location provided is not valid. Click OK and check the Status field for more information.'

The Status indicates: Authorization is required for this network service

According to:

http://blogs.adobe.com/acrolaw/2014/05/hosting-a-shared-review-an-alternative-to-acrobat-com/

... there should then be a prompt for the WebDav username and WebDav password, but this doesn't happen.

Acrobat 'helpfully' tells me that I need authorisation, but does not seem to allow me to enter the details.

Is there a way around this?

Many thanks,

David

[David Hollis · Accepted solution]

It looks like the answer is relatively simple!

Acrobat seems to require the details of a sub-folder, not a root folder. The only clue is in the prompt:

http://<Server Name>/<Folder Name>

Unfortunately, Acrobat only does a very simple parse of the URL.

If you happen to enter a root folder, then Acrobat gives the error message above.

The commercial server in the example on the blog page provides a sub-folder by default.

If you want to use, say, a web hosting account that offers WebDAV, or maybe an Amazon AWS server then you have to create a subfolder.

A ridiculously simple solution, but the error message didn't help, and nor did the simple parsing.

David

[David Hollis]

Hmmm, well, it did work, but with a relatively straight forward URL that contained a port number.

However, it seems that Acrobat does have a problem with a Amazon AWS URL, even with a sub-folder.

[David Hollis]

This forum thread mentions the use of Fiddler or Charles to log the transactions between client and server:

Re: Shared Reviews on Adobe site terminated?!?​

I tried Charles, as this is the only one that works on Mac OS. It mapped the Amazon URL to https://127.0.0.1:8888/​

I was then able to connect!

However, this meant I could not see the traffic associated with the failure to connect.

[David Hollis]

One very simple hypothesis is that Acrobat simply doesn't like to work with an unsecured WebDAV server. That is one with a http:// URL rather than https://

Despite the fact that the prompt indicates http://, I don't think Acrobat actually accepts it.

I have managed to set up shared reviews with the commercial server in the example, and that does use a secured URL.

It is worth noting that the URL that Charles maps to includes https://, so that would add weight to this hypothesis.