WebNFS

WebNFS is an extension to the NFS file system for allowing clients to access a file system over the internet using a simplified, firewall-friendly protocol.

WebNFS was developed to give Java applets and other internet enabled applications a way of acessing filesystem services over the internet. While NFS provides applications on Unix with full filesystem semantics, not all of these might be needed in a distributed, read-only web environment. Conversly access restrictions - such as requiring the use of restricted ports for originating requests - normally used in closed environments are not usually applicable in public distributed environments.

WebNFS makes use of a well known port (port 2049 on both UDP and TCP) thus avoiding the overhead and unpredictability of using the PORTMAP protocol. WebNFS adds public filehandles and multicomponent lookups to the NFS protocol.