Re: URI/URI ref distinction (was on "How to Compare Uniform Resource Identifiers")

GK@ninebynine.org (Graham Klyne) writes:
>I found TimBL's posting to be very illuminating:
>
>   http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-tag/2002Sep/0043.html
>
>I think there's an important identifier/reference distinction to be 
>maintained here.

I think TimBL has made a fundamental mistake.  

In that post, he appears not to recognize the representation-bound
nature of fragment identifiers and thereby permits himself to conflate
resource identifiers with identifiers tangled in representation issues.
Calling them both URIs is perfectly fine, if the "R" can stand
alternately for "resource" and "representation" - because the nature of
the identification process itself changes as soon as a fragment
identifier is used.

If this is illumination, it is very dark in here.

There are cases where this doesn't matter.  There are cases where this
does matter.  Recognizing the difference seems like a good first step
toward understanding both the power and the limitations of Web
architecture.
-- 
Simon St.Laurent
Ring around the content, a pocket full of brackets
Errors, errors, all fall down!
http://simonstl.com -- http://monasticxml.org

Received on Wednesday, 15 January 2003 09:40:47 UTC