Re: Proposed Charter and Agenda for IRI BOF at IETF 76

On Sep 26, 2009, at 5:13 PM, Maciej Stachowiak wrote:

> The definition for how to perform forgiving processing of resource  
> identifiers originally started out in the HTML5 spec, where you  
> suggest it should go. However, it was moved to a separate document  
> based on strong objections from many parties. I understand from the  
> below that your objection was solely to the use of the term "URL",  
> and not to these processing rules being in the HTML spec. But that  
> was not the sole objection. Many thought it was architecturally  
> wrong to define these rules in the HTML spec. Thus, while I'm sure  
> Ian Hickson would be perfectly happy to put the processing  
> requirements back in HTML5, I'm not sure that is an acceptable long- 
> term solution.

I think it is hopeless to trace back all the screwed-up  
misunderstandings
of Web architecture that led to anyURI, LEIRI, and now HTML5-URL.
I think I explained how it is supposed to work, succinctly and to the
point where actual text can be applied to the HTML5 draft that will
resolve all objections and settle this matter once and for all.
If not, then we can deal with those new objections when they arise.

> Furthermore, besides the general architectural objection, there may  
> be applications and technologies that wish to use HTML-style loose  
> processing rules. Having those rules in the HTML spec instead of in  
> a standalone specification makes it more difficult to reuse the  
> technology.

Those rules already exist in RFC3986, Appendix B.  What does not
exist there is the behavior after parsing into the components,
since that behavior is entirely application-dependent.  If HTML5
wants to define that behavior, it can do so only if the requirements
are stated to be specific to browser-like applications.

> On a more philosophical level: a lot more resource identifiers are  
> extracted from attributes in HTML documents than from the sides of  
> busses. It is not clear to me why the side-of-bus use case should  
> be privileged. IRIs are a standard for the Internet, not for  
> vehicular advertising. And indeed, many print ads these days drop  
> the initial http: from the addresses they print.

Also explained in 3986.  I don't remember if that was copied into 3987.

> For an Internet standard, there is nothing wrong with defining  
> rules for lenient processing as well as the syntax of strictly  
> conforming input. Doing so can convert "experiment[s] in  
> forgiveness" into interoperability.

There is nothing wrong with defining correct processing rules for
whatever thing you are trying to process, whether those rules be
strict or lenient.  The problem is saying that the rules are for
processing X when in fact you are actually processing Y and then
unilaterally declaring that Y is the new definition of X.

....Roy

Received on Sunday, 27 September 2009 01:07:00 UTC