Re: Two proposals for HTTP/2.0

According to hallam@axal04.cern.ch:
> 
> Re the first proposal, to incorporate the hostname somewhere. This
> would be cleanest put into the URL itself :-
> 
> GET http://hostname/fred http/2.0
> 
> This is the syntax for proxy redirects.
> 

The only thing objectionable about this is that it is a substantial
change from the HTTP/1.0.  I suppose we could say the syntax is

GET URL HTTP/??

and that HTTP/1.0 only allows relative URLs (i.e. relative to the host
being queried).

> 
> This suggestion conflicts with the aims of the second I'm affraid. I
> don't think that its a good thing for a server to not know its name.
> Proxying is far too prevelant now and a server that doth not know
> its name shall be called a LOOP. 
> 

Obviously a proxy server would have to know its own name.  But a small
gateway that speaks HTTP on one side and accesses a local service on
the other side shouldn't need to.  (Am I wrong about this? How would
that create a loop?).  The proposal was to make it possible for such
a gateway to use file system names in URL's without being required
to know its own name.

Parenthetically, IMHO proxy servers and regular servers should be 
different programs.  Their purposes are quite different.

John Franks

Received on Thursday, 17 November 1994 06:23:26 UTC