Re: comments on 30/3/2001 AM draft

christopher ferris wrote:

> [...] as an intermediary may add blocks to the message, the fault may not
> necessarily lie with the originator of the message, but in the intermediary
> that appends the block(s) that caused the problem. Should the fault be communicated
> to the intermediary that produced the block(s) at fault? Should the fault be also
> propogated back to the originator of the message?

Let's suppose for a moment that the intermediary is not allowed to piggy-back blocks onto the message
(M1) sent by the "originator", but that it sends a separate message (M2) instead. If M2 was to fail,
the intermediary would be informed. Conversely, if M1 was to fail, the originator would be informed.

Consequently, IMO, if a message fails, and that message contains any intermediary-block, then *both*
the intermediary *and* the originator need to be informed, regardless of whether the block was added
by the originator or the intermediary. They are both interested in finding out that the message
failed.

Now, is this whole paragraph not in contradiction anyway with other parts of the AM that say XMLP is
best-effort/one-way only?

> 3) In section 3.1.3, the assertion that the Correlation parameter references
> a message previously forwarded seems to eliminate the possibility that
> a message might be related to another that takes an alternate path between
> source and destination. e.g.
>         a->b->c and c->d->a   [...]

Unless the MessageRef parameter is initially set by the originator? (and intermediaries use
(originator, MessageRef) to correlate messages).

Alternatively, the path may be set to:
        a->b->d->c and c->d->b->a
with d being transparent on the way forward, b on the way back.


I agree with your other comments.

Jean-Jacques.

Received on Tuesday, 3 April 2001 04:37:53 UTC