web intents agent !== user agent

Dear all,

Web Intents, as in the current draft, is implemented entirely within the 
User Agent.
If the UA does not know of an intent, it cannot be invoked.
In a sense, the way the spec is written, the Web Intents Agent MUST be 
the User Agent.
I think that is wrong, architecturally speaking, in the sense of 
"architecture of the web".

I remember a discussion about a hierarchy of intent directories: if the 
UA does not know about an intent, it should pass the buck to a higher 
authority, possibly recursively.
The model is that there may be an intent register at the device level, 
one at the home level, one at the ISP level, etc.
The way the draft is written means EVERYTHING has to be done by the UA, 
and I do not see how the model I describe could be realized with the 
current draft.

 From a different point of view, I am sure there is a missing feature 
here, in the sense that the directory of intents that is meaningful to 
"me as a user" is NOT tied to a browser, nor to a particular computer or 
computing device, nor to a location (home or office), etc. So the 
current draft is "mistaken" in focusing everything on the UA rather than 
on the user.

It is OK to have a default implementation of the Web Intents Agent (WIA) 
inside the User Agent, but it should be possible to supercede it with a 
more powerful implementation, or one with a more secure approach (e.g. 
webinos).
For example, the UA-native implementation would just have one single, 
non-hierarchical WIA.
But then, if I am an advanced user, I should be able to switch to a WIA 
e.g. with multiple "circles" (me, family, friends).

And I should be able to share a Web Intents configuration regardless of 
which browser I am using at any time or on any device (specially if the 
device forces me to use one browser).

Does this make sense to others ?
Best regards
JC

-- 
JC Dufourd
Directeur d'Etudes/Professor
Groupe Multimedia/Multimedia Group
Traitement du Signal et Images/Signal and Image Processing
Telecom ParisTech, 37-39 rue Dareau, 75014 Paris, France
Tel: +33145817733 - Mob: +33677843843 - Fax: +33145817144

Received on Monday, 4 June 2012 17:16:51 UTC