Re: CT - interacting with the user

 > suspect it would meet my test for "this is a reasonable approach".
 >
no, far from it, the man on the Clapham omnibus would not think this 
reasonable, as he struggles to use the Transport for London Web site 
that has been mysteriously mis-rendered as a result of a transforming 
proxy ...

 > Anyway, talk to you about this soon...
lookin fwd to it


Jo
On 29/09/2009 14:18, Charles McCathieNevile wrote:
> On Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:11:55 +0200, Jo Rabin <jrabin@mtld.mobi> wrote:
> 
>> OK. I had thought it would be hard to construe the document in such a 
>> way that a terms of service agreement would suffice ... but even if 
>> that is the case perhaps there is still scope for people doing so. So 
>> can you please note specifically where you think this is the case and 
>> suggest editorial remedies to make sure it is clear.
> 
> As far as I can tell, the document makes no statements whatever about 
> how to do this, so while it is drawing a legalistic bow of some length, 
> the interpetation can be made to stand up against the requirements of 
> the document.
> 
> To go a bit further, I am not convinced that we should be mandating what 
> I suspect the group intuitively understands but has not expressed by 
> "inform the user". In particular, any attempt to tell people whose 
> business model is based on providing a particular rendering, what that 
> rendering should include, has to be based on extremely solid 
> requirements that are demonstrably necessary for the user.
> 
> Likewise, would "provide a website where the user can go and alter their 
> preferences (and look up their use history)" meet the requirements? I 
> certainly wouldn't want to mandate that as what must be done, but I 
> suspect it would meet my test for "this is a reasonable approach".
> 
> Anyway, talk to you about this soon...
> 
> cheers
> 
> Chaals
> 
>> Jo
>>
>> On 28/09/2009 13:02, Charles McCathieNevile wrote:
>>> On Mon, 28 Sep 2009 12:37:54 +0200, Jo Rabin <jrabin@mtld.mobi> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Chaals
>>>>
>>>> The requirement on the proxy only kicks in when they are doing 
>>>> things that mean they are stepping out from behind the transparency 
>>>> you discuss.
>>>  No, the transparency I discuss is not the one mentioned in the spec, 
>>> but
>>> the fact that the user isn't generally in direct communication with the
>>> proxy (the user agent is), but is getting presented something that
>>> purports to be the content s/he is looking for, as transformed by the
>>> proxy.
>>>
>>>> So I'd prefer to remain silent on this. Many of the proxies we are 
>>>> talking about in this case, do in fact communicate directly with the 
>>>> user. I don't think we should mandate the nature of the communication.
>>>  Well, as I understand it we are mandating a set of interactions by
>>> requiring the proxy to get some information from the user, or give the
>>> user some information. Is it sufficient to deliver these in a terms of
>>> service agreement, or do we mean that these should be live interactions
>>> during the browser session?
>>>  And if we mean the latter, what are the minimum ways to satisfy this 
>>> - is
>>> it sufficient to add a link back to the proxy for warnings and
>>> interactions somewhere after the bottom of the content the proxy is 
>>> being
>>> asked to present, or do these need to be visible warnings presented 
>>> before
>>> the page itself?
>>>  I agree that we should be very conservative in mandating interaction 
>>> behaviour, but I think in the current draft we are simply 
>>> underspecifying requirements, and since I believe that a terms of 
>>> service agreement satisfies the current draft, but I believe that is 
>>> not what the group has in mind, I think we need to get a bit more 
>>> clarity on this.
>>>  cheers
>>>  Chaals
>>>
>>>> Cheers
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>  From Chaals:
>>>>
>>>> Proxies by their nature don't generally interact directly with the 
>>>> user. I
>>>> think it is worth explaining what we mean by "inform the user", "advise
>>>> the user", "allow the user to..." etc.
>>>>
>>>> One approach is for the proxy to ship content explicitly to the user
>>>> (instead, presumably, of what the user actually asked for). Another 
>>>> is to
>>>> make flags available to the user agent which is accessing the proxy 
>>>> (e.g.
>>>> generating 300 responses, vary headers, or the like) which would 
>>>> allow the
>>>> UA to do whatever it normally does that allows the user to make 
>>>> choices.
>>>>
>>>> This question is important because at the moment we seem to be implying
>>>> requirements on the proxy which either make assumptions about the 
>>>> UA, or
>>>> contradict the goal of letting the user simply go to the content they
>>>> asked for (which is the service proxies generally provide, trying to 
>>>> be if
>>>> not transparent in teh terms of the document then at least as 
>>>> invisible as
>>>> possible).
>>>>
>>>> cheers
>>>>
>>>> Chaals
>>>>
>>>
> 
>

Received on Tuesday, 29 September 2009 13:26:23 UTC