Re: Request methods that allow an entity-body [i19]

Ah, thanks Mark, I forgot about that discussion.

IMO, the changes in your/Roy's proposal all impose requirements on
implementations, and/or assume that defining new methods or response
codes which cannot include an entity body is desirable.  I expect that
as long as the meaning of the message is clear, then little more need
be said.  And in order for the meaning to be clear, we just need to
say that entity bodies don't alter the meaning of the message envelope
around it (i.e. it can be ignored).

However, that would be a pretty significant change that goes beyond
the constraints of the charter.  So I'm content with your proposal
because it does improve upon the current text.

Mark.

On 11/30/07, Mark Nottingham <mnot@mnot.net> wrote:
> Previous to this, the most recent proposal on this issue (#19):
>   <http://www.w3.org/mid/0B0A6372-C332-40A1-AF9D-252B8B1EF0BA@mnot.net>
>
> Not too much discussion happened then; do we need a new proposal?
>
>
> On 30/11/2007, at 7:29 AM, Mark Baker wrote:
>
> >
> > On 11/30/07, Scott Nichol <snicholnews@scottnichol.com> wrote:
> >> The original portion of the spec I was questioning is
> >>
> >> <quote>
> >> The presence of a message-body in a request is signaled by the
> >> inclusion
> >> of a Content-Length or Transfer-Encoding header field in the
> >> request's
> >> message-headers. A message-body MUST NOT be included in a request
> >> if the
> >> specification of the request method (Section 5.1.1) does not allow
> >> sending an entity-body in requests.
> >> </quote>
> >>
> >> If Roy says "HTTP allows a message body on any request", then why
> >> does
> >> the second sentence in the above even appear in the spec?
> >
> > Those aren't inconsistent, but I reckon trying to be prescriptive in
> > that way makes little sense as, IMO, it should be a best practice not
> > to define methods which preclude entity bodies, if only for reasons of
> > extensibility.  *shrug*
> >
> >> I was concerned that the spec does not say in the description of any
> >> request method that an entity-body is not allowed.  Based on what Roy
> >> says, the spec is correct: there is no request method for which an
> >> entity-body is not allowed.  That an entity-body for a HEAD or GET
> >> would
> >> be "useless" is not relevant.  A client is allowed send one and a
> >> server
> >> must parse it.
> >>
> >> What does "must parse it" imply?
> >
> > There's no requirement that the server *do* anything with the
> > entity body.
> >
> >> I raised this issue because of a specific problem between NuSOAP and
> >> lighttpd.  The former sends a GET with Content-Length: 0 when
> >> fetching
> >> WSDL.  The latter responds with "400 Bad Request" because of the
> >> message-body.  Would that server behavior be considered out of spec?
> >> The server presumably "parsed" the request.
> >
> > Yes, the server is buggy.
> >
> > FWIW, the message that kicked off the thread I referenced came to be
> > because of the same problem; some client (the Swiss HttpClient IIRC)
> > inserting "Content-Length: 0" and a server (Tomcat) choking on it.
> >
> > Mark.
> > --
> > Mark Baker.  Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.         http://www.markbaker.ca
> > Coactus; Web-inspired integration strategies  http://www.coactus.com
> >
>
>
> --
> Mark Nottingham     http://www.mnot.net/
>
>


-- 
Mark Baker.  Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.         http://www.markbaker.ca
Coactus; Web-inspired integration strategies  http://www.coactus.com

Received on Sunday, 2 December 2007 17:48:32 UTC