Re: Proposed issue: site metadata hook (slight variation)

Patrick.Stickler@nokia.com wrote,
> > * It doesn't address TimBLs "meta meta" problem.
>
> Not true. MGET has no "meta meta" problem.

Well, I guess we differ here. I thought that TimBLs challenge was a 
resonable one and that your response was coherent but unconvincing.

> Can GET return anything other than a representation of the specified
> resource? I don't think it can.

A Meta: request header would provide a way of allowing a client and a 
server to negotiate a variation on the normal GET semantics. There's no 
obvious _technical_ obstacle to doing this.

> And descriptive knowledge about a resource is not IMHO a
> representation of the resource.

Agreed.

> And what about abstract or non-web accessible resources? If there is
> no representation available, GET will return 404, No?

Sure, but assuming the existence of metadata, that could be returned in 
response to a Meta:-qualified GET, eg.,

  GET /some-namespace-uri HTTP/1.1
  Host: whatever

             HTTP/1.1 404 Not found

  GET /some-namespace-uri HTTP/1.1
  Host: whatever
  Meta: application/rddl+xml

             HTTP/1.1 200 OK
             Content-Type: application/rddl+xml
             Meta-Location: http://whatever/whereever/some-namespace-uri
                
             ... RDDL stuff ...

Again, there's no _technical_ obstacle to this: I could build a client 
and server with this behaviour using standard toolkits today.
  
> But MGET will return a description (if available) irregardless of
> whether any representation is also available.

Sure, that'd work too, in principle ... but how are you going to get it 
deployed?

Cheers,


Miles

Received on Wednesday, 12 February 2003 06:59:59 UTC