TIBCO objects to last call (resend)

  This message details TIBCO's reasons for objecting to the 
WS-Addressing core and SOAP binding documents going to last call.  There 
are several specific reasons, all of which center around the Message 
Addressing Properties (hereafter referred to as MAPs), and particularly 
around issues i050 and i054, which we consider to have been closed 
hastily.  We have no objection to the current formulation of EPRs and 
indeed believe that WS-Addressing would provide considerable value on 
the basis of EPRs alone.

We have made our opposition to the current resolution of i054 known and 
have formally voted against this resolution.  We are prepared to 
formally object to the core and SOAP binding specifications as they 
currently stand on the basis of this issue.  We also note that a new 
proposed resolution for this putatively closed issue has appeared since 
the vote concerning last call was taken. 

Whatever the final resolution of i050 and i054, there currently remain 
significant questions as to the meaning of MAPs in the specification.  
Many such questions, including those relating to the objections above, 
have been raised in public discussion over the past two weeks but have 
so far gone unanswered.  It is our opinion that several of these 
questions are of such a nature that if there is any significant doubt 
concerning them the specification is not sufficiently well-defined to be 
useful.  We do not claim that none of them can be answered, and in fact 
we hope that many of them can be answered quickly.  However, until they 
are, we cannot consider the discussion of the specification to be 
materially complete and cannot recommend putting the document out for 
public comment.

These questions include

    * Whether the MAPs are considered to contain only those properties
      defined in the WS-Addressing specifications or whether other
      specifications may amend them
    * If other specifications can amend this set, in what sense may it
      be said to be specified by WS-Addressing
    * Exactly how a future specification requiring endpoints beyond the
      presently defined reply and fault endpoints should define these
    * In particular whether such a specification would have to define a
      new SOAP module to hold properties parallel to those defined in
      the MAPs
    * How the current definition of MAPs as mandatory properties would
      apply to existing SOAP/HTTP interactions which have no notion of
      such properties
    * Whether existing specifications would need to be amended to
      mention MAPs and/or their corresponding headers in order to
      leverage the asynchronous request/reply pattern to which the MAPs
      are evidently tailored, as suggested by the explicit mention of
      ReplyTo and other headers in specifications such as WS-Transfer
      and WS-Enumeration
    * What level of MAP extensibility is actually required by the
      WS-Addressing charter.

Please consider this listing as a request to open these outstanding 
questions as formal issues.

While we understand and indeed share the desire of the group to get to 
last call as quickly as reasonably possible, given the current state of 
the specification and the discussion around it, we regret to say that we 
cannot support the documents going to last call at this point, and so 
must object.

Received on Thursday, 24 March 2005 00:57:42 UTC