Re: Netscape vs. Digest

At 01:42 PM 8/27/96 -0500, John Franks wrote:
>I am not sure this attack on Netscape is justified.  To the best of my

I didn't consider the statements I made to be an attack.  Just truths.
Independent of whether or not the statements were an 'attack' I think the
statements were justified.

>knowledge Microsoft also does not support digest.  Some earlier
>versions of MSIE supported digest authentication, but the latest
>version has apparently withdrawn that support.  (These comments are

Given Paul Leach's involvement with discussion on Digest in his working
group, I have faith that Microsoft would not ship a HTTP/1.1 product without
Digest support (How's that for pressure Paul?) -- especially if we mandate
it for HTTP/1.1 compliance.

>both Netscape and Microsoft will support it.  I don't know if either
>will.  But, on the whole, I think Netscape has been more open and
>"internet friendly" than any other major corporation and singling them

I have not said Netscape has been an unfriendly, un-open (I might be
thinking it, but I haven't made available my opinions on Netscape in this
forum) company...

<sidetrack>
...although I will say I'm quite irked when you say Netscape has been *more*
internet friendly than any other major corporation.  Maybe "even" at best.
You could have picked any number of large companies that have been even more
standards oriented, and I wouldn't have disagreed if you had picked
Spyglass.  Netscape is much maligned, certainly overly so, but they haven't
been poster children of IETF process either.  That cookie draft sure took a
long time to appear, and even then it wasn't without extraordinary efforts
from Kristol.  Then there's all the HTML extensions that were never put into
an internet draft, or didn't even show up quickly (yet?) in publicly
available DTDs.
</sidetrack>

I have only said that indications I've received imply Netscape needs to be
coaxed to support Digest, because they, as of recently, had no plans to
support it.

-----
Daniel DuBois, Traveling Coderman -- NEW! http://www.spyglass.com/~ddubois/
         Roses are red, violets are blue, this .sig doesn't rhyme.

Received on Tuesday, 27 August 1996 13:18:39 UTC