Apologies/Plans for next libwww release

Hello,

I first apologize because I haven't had as much time as I'd like to
participate in the list and integrate the submitted patches. I'll have more
time for working on libwww starting from January and I'll catch up.
Many thanks to the other libwww developers who have write access to the
CVS base for having shared this work so far. 

As I had said in a previous mail, I have two roles when working on libwww. 
One is as official w3c contact, like for example, preparing new releases,
solving server problems, opening access to our CVS base, ... The other one
is as developer and user of libwww. As this is a community project, I expect
everyone to be active on it, not just me. This has been working quite fine
so far. I thank Olga, Rafaele, John, Bob, Vladimir, and all the
others  for their continuous contributions and activity.

I think we have had many patches since the last libwww release. I propose
we make a new release in January, to "celebrate" the change of century and
also so that the project doesn't look stalled (which it isn't).

Some things I'd like to do in the next year:

- new libwww release. I propose we make a new release in January, to
  "celebrate" the change of century and also to reflect all the patches
  we have had.

- Remove the backward compatibility to HTTP/0.9. Due to faulty server
  implementation or network delays, libwww may decide it's talking to an
  HTTP/0.9 server. The problem is that once libwww switches to this backward 
  compatibility mode, it's impossible to upgrade. All requests return
  a correct code, but no network access are done anymore. Maybe some of
  you have had this problem before, or one where suddenly libwww doesn't 
  request you to authenticate anymore and says all is OK. I believe these
  problems come from this backward compatiblity.

  The work here is to add a different error handling, but leave the
  protocol as declared in the host entity.

- Exportable SSL support. Olga first submitted some patches, then Henrik
  inspired himself on them to make a libwww SSL module. Bad news... it 
  cannot be exported from the USA. I'm currently  investigating if we can 
  remove this restriction. Otherwise, I will rewrite the module from scratch 
  and distribute it from France or from some other country other than the USA.
  Many people have asked for this and I think that it's the only way to have
  more developers help improving it.

- Digest authentication. Apache changed its digest authentication 
  implementation. The one I did needs a bit upgrading to be able to fully
  exploit the possibilities of the apache implementation.

- FTP. A user warned me that libwww's implementation of the FTP client isn't
  fully compatible anymore. This problem started after a CERT advisory
  warning. We need someone to check it out and upgrade the FTP module.
  I'm thinking about Bob :)

Do you have any plans to integrate/develop/improve something else in libwww?
Send them to the list! :)

Also, feel free to send your reactions to my propositions.

Thanks,

Best greetings,

-Jose

Received on Tuesday, 21 December 1999 09:44:11 UTC