Re: XQuery and GET

At 09:41 PM 10/15/2003, Mark Baker wrote:

>Greetings,
>
>I believe XQuery is missing an important feature; the ability to
>serialize a document in URI form, so that the resulting URI may be used
>as an argument to the GET method.

Hi Mark - I am not sure whether I understand this. Are you simply saying 
you want to be able to write a query to create another query, then use that 
query as an argument to GET?

>Consider the recent TAG finding regarding the use of HTTP GET;
>
>"Use GET if [...] The interaction is more like a question (i.e., it is
>a safe operation such as a query, read operation, or lookup)."
>  -- http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/whenToUseGet.html
>
>Being able to perform a query via GET requires that a URI serialization
>of the query (i.e. the XQuery document) be provided.  Without this, the
>only way that querying can be performed interoperably would be via POST.

True, but I think it's also important to keep in mind that:

>Web application design should be informed by the above principles, but 
>also by the relevant limitations.
>-- http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/whenToUseGet.html#practical

There are limits to what fits easily on a URI. A 12 page query with 
functions and schema imports probably doesn't naturally fit into this 
framework.

Jonathan 

Received on Friday, 17 October 2003 09:40:09 UTC