HEAD vs OPTIONS

Dear all,

[[
LDP 1.0. 4.6.1 LDPR servers MUST support the HTTP HEAD method.
]]

The HEAD method has been confused with the OPTIONS one.

According to section 9.4 in the HTTP/1.1 specification, the HEAD method 
“is identical to GET except that the server MUST NOT return a 
message-body in the response. The metainformation contained in the HTTP 
headers in response to a HEAD request SHOULD be identical to the 
information sent in response to a GET request. This method can be used 
for obtaining metainformation about the entity implied by the request 
without transferring the entity-body itself. This method is often used 
for testing hypertext links for validity, accessibility, and recent 
modification”.

In contrast, according to section 9.2 of the same specification, the 
OPTIONS method “represents a request for information about the 
communication options available on the request/response chain identified 
by the Request-URI. This method allows the client to determine the 
options and/or requirements associated with a resource, or the 
capabilities of a server, without implying a resource action or 
initiating a resource retrieval”.

Proposal:
Rewrite the specification using OPTIONS instead of HEAD and/or clarify 
the use of OPTIONS and the use of HEAD in the LDP protocol.

Kind regards,

-- 

Dr. Raúl García Castro
http://delicias.dia.fi.upm.es/~rgarcia/

Ontology Engineering Group
Departamento de Inteligencia Artificial
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid
Campus de Montegancedo, s/n - Boadilla del Monte - 28660 Madrid
Phone: +34 91 336 36 70 - Fax: +34 91 352 48 19

Received on Thursday, 16 May 2013 14:25:23 UTC