RE: need a reviewer (or three) for draft-cai-ssdp-v1-00.txt

> I do agree with you, however, that HTTP provides most of the features
> needed by most client-server applications.  If the application only
> needs to do RPC like things (even with moderately large payloads), 
> doesn't need efficiency (most don't), and isn't likely to be heavily 
> used or used over wireless links, or multicast, then HTTP is probably 
> fine.  However wireless is likely to become a lot more important very 
> soon and that to me is enough by itself to make HTTP a very dubious
> contender as a base for future applications.  (similarly for 
> SMTP and IMAP)

My own experience shows that HTTP works like a champ over wireless. Its
large granularity commands work extremely well over high latency links.
However it may be that the particular usage profiles I'm involved with are
biased in a manner which make HTTP function properly. What issues do you
have with HTTP over unicast and multicast UDP?

> 
> > P.S. As for HTTP's complexity. HTTP itself is an unbelievably simple
> > protocol. The problem is that it has inherited a lot of 
> cruft over the
> > years, 99.99% of which is optional and not widely 
> supported. I believe that
> > what the world really needs is a re-written version of the 
> HTTP spec. One
> > organized into a more rational structure which shows the 
> true beauty of
> > HTTP's layered architecture. I would be willing to bet that 
> one could write
> > a spec providing the absolute bare minimum information 
> needed to create a
> > compliant client/proxy/server in 20 pages.
> 
> That seems like a stretch - in particular the interaction of cacheing
> proxies is just too complex.  But I'd love to see somebody try.
> 

Caching proxies are simple, **IF** you only do the basic caching that actual
works. People run into problems when they try to get fancy and support
features no one needs or uses. I would bet you could explain the entire
minimally compliant/maximally useful HTTP proxy caching system in two pages.

> Keith
> 

				Yaron

Received on Wednesday, 10 March 1999 17:47:15 UTC