Re: DESCRIBE ENDPOINT

On 30 Jun 2009, at 23:39, Paul Gearon wrote:

> On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 3:58 PM, Steve  
> Harris<steve.harris@garlik.com> wrote:
>> On 30 Jun 2009, at 18:23, Axel Polleres wrote:
> <snip/>
>>>> On a slightly separate note, the "DESCRIBE <endpoint-URI>" form  
>>>> may be
>>>> capable of referring to descriptions on other endpoints. May that's
>>>> something we want to consider (or to exclude).
>>>
>>> yeah, that makes it look appealing somehow.
>>
>> On the downside, you have to know that the endpoint speaks SPARQL  
>> before you
>> can ask that query with any expectation of getting a sensible  
>> response.
>
> That presumes you are only making calls to the server through HTTP.
> While this is certainly very common, there are numerous cases of
> communication through an API as well (eg. Jena sans Joseki). In that
> case you know you have SPARQL, but you may not know what the
> capabilities are.

Well, in that case you're using some non-standard protocol, so you'd  
expect to know what you're talking to, no?
We also have a non-HTTP protocol that we can use (for persistent  
connections), but it's not as if someone could just discover it out in  
the wild and wonder what capabilities it had in any useful was, as  
they'd have no idea how to speak to it in the first place.

In any case, as it's non-standard the protocol can provide some way to  
get an RDF document describing the capabilities out.

- Steve

-- 
Steve Harris
Garlik Limited, 2 Sheen Road, Richmond, TW9 1AE, UK
+44(0)20 8973 2465  http://www.garlik.com/
Registered in England and Wales 535 7233 VAT # 849 0517 11
Registered office: Thames House, Portsmouth Road, Esher, Surrey, KT10  
9AD

Received on Wednesday, 1 July 2009 08:52:39 UTC