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Re: Multiple Content-Location headers

From: Ross Patterson <Ross_Patterson@ns.reston.vmd.sterling.com>
Date: Thu, 15 Jan 98 16:05:27 EST
Message-Id: <199801152118.AA13442@reston.vmd.sterling.com>
To: http-wg%cuckoo.hpl.hp.com@hplb.hpl.hp.com
X-Mailing-List: <http-wg@cuckoo.hpl.hp.com> archive/latest/5194
jg@pa.dec.com (Jim Gettys) writes:

>To quote from section 4.2 of the HTTP spec:
>
>"Multiple message-header fields with the same field-name may be present in
>a message if and only if the entire field-value for that header field is
>defined as a comma-separated list [i.e., #(values)]. It MUST be possible
>to combine the multiple header fields into one "field-name: field-value"
>pair, without changing the semantics of the message, by appending each
>subsequent field-value to the first, each separated by a comma.

And to add from the long-expired-but-still-regarded-as-authoritative
CGI Internet Draft (draft-robinson-www-interface-01.txt, 15 February
1996) in section 5 "Environment Variables" (pp. 8):

   "If multiple headers with the same field-name are received then
   they must be rewritten as a single header having the same
   semantics."

Not only must it be *possible* to normalize headers, when running a CGI
program all headers *must* be normalized for its pool of variables.

Ross Patterson
Sterling Software, Inc.
VM Software Division
Received on Thursday, 15 January 1998 13:19:21 UTC

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