Home | Appendix

Quick links: |  | Securing Your Shared Databases Sharing a Database Using the Web Interface Accessing Your Data Over the Internet

SERVER

|  |  | Web sharing

DEVONthink allows you to give others on the local network access to your databases using a standard web browser on any operating system (including Windows and Linux). The embedded web server provides an interactive web interface that allows defined users to interact with the shared databases. Here are the first steps to getting started using this powerful feature. Securing Your Shared Databases Before you start sharing your data it's a good idea to check the security settings. To enhance the security for the databases you broadcast, you define users and give them per-database permissions. You will also set a certificate for the server, so the connecting users can validate they are connecting to a safe server. These items are set in Preferences > Server. Users will only be able to interact with the databases based on the permissions you give them, including disallowing them even to see certain databases.
Note: Depending on the certificate settings specified in the preferences, a warning about an invalid certificate may be shown when users access the web sharing. This is especially true when using a self-signed certificate. While this warning is something to be suspicious of when browsing in general, you and your users can accept it in this case.
Sharing a Database Start and stop the server: Once the certificate and users have been set up to your liking, press the Start button to start the server. You can also select the Tools > Start Server command or choose the Start Server option in DEVONthink's dock icon. If the server is running, these will display Stop instead. Share your server's address: Once the web server is started, you will see links at the bottom of the preference pane. These are the active links you will share to individuals you have defined as users. One option is to Control-click the link, select Share from the contextual menu, and share it via your preferred method. You can also use Copy Link and paste it where you need to. Lastly, you can click and drag the link directly to many applications, like Apple Messages. The person who receives your link will open the page, login with the username and mandatory password you've defined for them, and have access to the databases you want them to see. If you have specified a port in the preferences, your users may be able to add a bookmark to their browser for quick access.
Note: We believe in data privacy and hope you do too. Browsers may present options to save login credentials. Some may even save the credentials by default. We are cautious of the first and not a fan of the second. If the user is on a shared computer, consider what access other users could have if using these options to save credentials.
Using the Web Interface The interactive web interface imitates the look-and-feel of DEVONthink in many ways, but in a condensed form. Contrary to a static web site, it only loads once; clicking buttons or links does not reload the whole page but dynamically updates it. This also means you should use the Back and Forward controls in the user interface instead of the ones in your browser's toolbar. Similar to the DEVONthink, the web interface is divided into panes: toolbar, sidebar, item list, and view/edit pane. But note some operations, e.g., deleting or organizing items, are dependent on the permissions you've been given for the specific databases. Sidebar: The sidebar is where you can navigate the databases' inboxes, groups, tags, and trashes in the sidebar. You can even drag items from the item list to reorganize things. Item List: Selecting items in the sidebar will display the contents in the item list. When using the standard preview position, the list can be sorted by clicking the column headers. There are options to enable or disable them in the contextual menu. Items can be dragged, handily for filing loose documents into groups. Double-click groups to display their contents in the item list. For quick navigation, press the < and > arrows to go back and forward to visited locations in the databases. You can also click the locations in the path bar above the item list to jump to a parent location. View/Edit pane: Displayed below the item list or to the right, depending on the preview choice made in the toolbar, this pane will attempt to display the contents of the selected file. Clicking and dragging the divider bar allows you to resize the pane, relative to the item list. A select number of file types, e.g., plain text, formatted notes, and Markdown files can be viewed and edited in this pane. When the Info inspector is shown it will display as a pane on the right side of the view/edit pane.
Note: Due to the limitations of browser technologies, some file types cannot be displayed.
Toolbar: Some handy options are available in the toolbar, including switching the position of the view/edit pane, adding some metadata, e.g label or rating, to a selected item, and creating groups and a few document types. It also has controls for uploading new documents and downloading currently selected ones. A user menu allows you to switch between English and German language and also provides a Log Out option for more security when allowing others access to the computer. Lastly, it gives you access to two powerful options: the See Also pane and the search field. See Also: When you show the inspector pane, the second view is a See Also view. This displays potentially related files in the current database you are viewing. Search: Searching the viewable databases can be done in the search field. Enter search terms, including using search prefixes to focus the searches. For example, you can do a search for `text:housing tags:government`. If you want to restrict where you're searching, select All Databases or a specific database to search in. Descriptions of the controls in the user interface can be found in the Web Sharing section of the Windows chapter. Accessing Your Data Over the Internet Web sharing is best used on a local area network (LAN). But there may be situations where you want to share the database to users that aren't on your network. While we can't provide specific support due to the differences in equipment and environments, we have provided a simple guide you can try. To access your database from outside your network, you need to make your Mac "visible" to the outside world. In general, when you a using a DSL or cable modem, you are also using a router. Routers create an intranet that your Mac is connected to and "route" traffic between the internet and your personal intranet. Now, you need to create a route from the outside leading to the Mac sharing your database. This offers a port on the outside that is directly connected to the port on which DEVONthink is publishing. If everything goes well, you will be able to access your database using an address like: `http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:port`, where `xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx` is your current public IP address. (Note: This is your router's address on the internet, not your Mac's.) Next, `port` is the outside port number leading to your published database. Port forwarding done manually: The following is only a rough outline of the steps needed to configure port forwarding manually. The precise way to do it varies from router to router. You will need to consult the manual for your router in order to determine exactly how to set things up. To configure port forwarding, follow these steps: Step 1: Begin by determining your Mac's public IP address. This can be done by visiting a web site like https://www.whatismyip.com from your machine. Step 2: Determine the port on which DEVONthink published on your Mac. You set the port in Preferences > Server. To publish on the internet, enter a port number here and do not let DEVONthink set it automatically as the port number may then change every time you open the application. Step 3: Determine your Mac's private IP address. The IP address is usually of the form `10.x.y.z`, `192.168.y.z` or `172.16.y.z`. You can find your Mac's private IP address by going to the Network preferences panel in System Preferences and looking it up under TCP/IP for the interface you are using (usually Built-In Ethernet or Wi-Fi). Step 4: Decide on a public port for DEVONthink. The port should be in the range 1025-65500. We suggest that you use port `8080`, which is traditionally a default port for private web servers. Step 5: Configure port forwarding on your router. The steps to do this vary from router to router, but all of them require you to provide these details: Public port, private destination IP, and private destination port. You found the private destination port in step 2, and the private destination IP in step 3, and you selected the public port in step 4. If you are in doubt about how you configure your router to do port forwarding, you need to consult the manual that came with your router. It is usually done through a web-based interface or custom-built administration application. For instance, AirPort routers can be configured using the AirPort Admin Utility. Step 6: Save the configuration changes on your router, and restart the router if required. At this point, you are ready to connect to your DEVONthink from the outside. Step 7: From the remote computer, open a web browser and enter the address as follows: `http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:port`, where `xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx` is the public IP address you found in step 1, and `port` the public port you selected in step 4. Press ↩ Return and you should get presented with your database's web interface. Setting up port forwarding can be tricky, but the difficult part is mainly in determining how to configure your particular router. If you are in doubt, search online for your router's name and combine it with a search for "port forwarding" or "port mapping."