Re: URLs in web-based groupware

At 17.19 +0100 99-02-15, <spreitze@parc.xerox.com> wrote:
> Considering only the reasons you cited for a user to want
>to mainly use a particular server, it seems a possible
>solution is to distinguish between the URL for an item's
>"full presentation" (which includes the decorations for
>navigation, cookies for managing the conversation between
>client and server, etc) and the URL for the item itself.
>E.g., think of the full presentation as having frames, one
>of which contains the item.  The full presentation is
>specific to a particular server; the item itself has just
>one URL and you don't care where it is.

This would be too difficult to users, to understand and distinguish
between two URLs and use the right one at the right time.

> There are even more reasons for wanting a family of
>"equivalent" URLs, and these are a general problem on the
>web.  The classic example is motivated by mirroring, where
>you want each user to be fetching from a "nearby" mirror
>and yet everybody communicates with URLs that are not
>mirror-specific.

That is handled by the URN standard, but we cannot use it,
because it is not supported by current web browsers.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jacob Palme <jpalme@dsv.su.se> (Stockholm University and KTH)
for more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme

Received on Tuesday, 16 February 1999 15:01:33 UTC