Re: Configuration support.

 I finally found some time to respond to some of the questions that were
raised by Fisher and others.

1. Configuration support is research.  (Fisher Mark)

Take a look at products like ClearCase, Continuum, AutoDesk WorkCenter, Ours
(Concorde), Documentum, etc.

2. If support for collections is provided is configuration addressed (Andre
van der Hoek).

Perhaps. Not having read the most recent draft that Jim put out it is hard
for me to say. What is important is to provide collection relative
addressing.  For example, when I check-out for /foo/bar/baz.html, what is
returned is /foo/bar/baz.html.1. Here the baz.html is actually considered a
collection of versions.

I should note that the above example is only one way of doing configurations
(as Jim has pointed out). In fact, if I remember the collection discussion
between Yaron and Judith, this is the only possibility (i.e., no selection
of a particular version based on properties of the document).  Yaron or
Judith should correct me if I am wrong on collections.

3. How does configurations affect the protocol (Larry Masinter)

The operation of check-out/check-in changes dramatically when you allow
configuration relative addressing. The above example should explain it. It
also affects the protocol because the client has to tell the server the
context (i.e., configuration) in which the current name (in the previous
example baz.html) has to be resolved.

Received on Monday, 29 September 1997 11:10:35 UTC