Re: [whatwg/url] [Editorial] Replace the term 'cannot-be-a-base' with hierarchical/non-hierarchical (#634)

> It just replaces a clear term "cannot be a base", which tells you what is different about these URLs, with an opaque undefined term, "hierarchical".

Except that "cannot be a base" is not a clear term, and it does not tell you what is different about these URLs. Let's say I parse a URL and attempt to set its hostname - where does the concept of a "base" URL come in to that operation? 

And how comes I _can_ use these "cannot be a base" URLs as base URLs if I'm only setting the fragment?

Clearly, "cannot be a base" is not adequately describing these URLs.

The dictionary.com definition is poor, sure. However, there "hierarchical" is not an opaque or undefined term - the components of the path are defined as representing a hierarchy, with ".." components moving up and other components moving down that hierarchical structure.

> This comment seems to be a [...] desire for 3986 syntax to be authoritative

Nope. This comment is motivated by the fact that I was entirely puzzled about what these URLs were supposed to represent or how I could describe them to users in terms of a URL's structure, until I stumbled upon a comment in rust-url calling them "non-hierarchical", and suddenly everything clicked. It's just a better name.


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