Setting Up Your Web Space

Setting up your Computing Science webpage

When you receive your Computing Science ID (CCID) web space is automatically allocated for you. Once it is set up, your site can be accessed at http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~<CCID>.

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Accessing webdocs from CS Departmental Linux Command Line

Connect to a departmental machine (e.g., innisfree) and your web documents will be available via NFS in the path /compsci/webdocs/<CCID>

  • There's a logs directory that contains read-only web logs (/compsci/webdocs/<CCID>/logs/), and
  • a web_docs directory (/compsci/webdocs/<CCID>/web_docs/), that contains web files such as html files.

This is ONLY available for Departmentally supported and maintained Linux workstations and servers.

When creating files via NFS, you will need to set permissions properly. The following requires some web server and Linux knowledge. You need to do this if, in your browser, you get a 403 error due to permission problems.

  • A setgid bit on your webdocs directory along with a group of apache is used.
    • apache is the web server's group.
  • To maintain the apache group, you will need to use umask. You cannot directly change the group to apache.
    • The default umask is likely 0077 (group and other permissions will be unset)
    • Change it to 0027 before creating directories or files (group write permissions will be unset, as will other permissions)
  • For security reasons, once you're done modifying webdocs files, it's best to revert to a more restrictive umask, such as 0077.
  • Note anything you publish this way is potentially world readable. To make things more secure, see Password protection below.
  • Other approaches can be taken. For futher information, please contact the Helpdesk. You will be directed to a staff member who can explain this further.

Notes

To access your web files from other systems please follow the directions at resources/technical-support/computing-resources/accessing-cs-home-dir-and-web-files

To check if your webdocs have been updated you can go to: http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~<CCID>/

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Password protection

You can create password protected directories on the webdocs system using .htaccess files.

Warning: When you link to a document that is in a directory protected by a .htaccess file you should always use https as the protocol part of the URL (ie. https://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~CCID/protected/foo.html). If you fail to link to it over the encrypted SSL connection, the user's password can be intercepted by a third party, compromising the password and "secured" documents. You also need to ensure your permissions are correct. Please contact the Helpdesk if required; you will be directed to a staff member who can assist you.

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Setting up your University of Alberta webpage

IST provides 24GB of storage space hosted on the Andrew File System (AFS) connected to your CCID. Follow IST's instructions to log in to the central server and set up a website in AFS. Once it is set up, your site can be accessed at http://www.ualberta.ca/~<CCID>.