Handling of Resource Forks
The Macintosh is unique in that it's files have 2 components - a Data fork and a Resource fork. An example of this would be what information an application like Adobe PhotoShop(R) will store when running on the Mac. In this example, the actual image data is contained in the Data fork. This is consistent with other platforms. However, in the Resource fork, specific Macintosh information is stored - like thumbnail icons, etc.
Starting with version 0.9 of Goliath, the Mac specific Resource information is now handled in a consistent and compatible manner. In fact, Goliath stores Mac resource information in the same format as the WebDAV file system in Apple's Mac OS X. So, any information stored by a WebDAV file system user will be completely compatible with users of Goliath. In addition to the Macintosh Resource fork, additional Finder metadata (such as file type and creator) is also stored by Goliath.
The format employed by Goliath (and by webdav_fs) is the Apple Double Format. Using this format, 2 distinct files are stored on the WebDAV server. The data component is stored as was in previous versions of Goliath; however, now the resource fork is stored in a 'hidden' Unix file. Use of this encoding should be seamless between MacOSX and Goliath clients; however users on other platforms may see files that begin with "._"; these are the special Apple files and can be safely ignored.