- From: John Stracke <francis@ecal.com>
- Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 13:12:07 +0000
- To: w3c-dist-auth@w3.org
Yoram Last wrote: > So an HTTP/1.1 > client must interpret a 207 as being the same as a 200, although it clearly > has a totally different meaning in WebDAV. I say again: it is not clear that the meaning is totally different. > But if given > methods have different semantics in the two protocols, But your "if" clause evaluates to false. > > That's a matter of opinion; I say it should be possible to delete a collection and > > know that clients that don't MKCOL it won't recreate it. The fact is that, as you > > admit, the HTTP/1.1 spec does not forbid the behavior which DAV prescribes. > > Nor does HTTP/1.1 forbids to disallow PUT altogether, or to disallow > resource names to have more than 5 characters, or... The point is that > it does allow functionality that WebDAV forbids, and this functionality > is being used (so it's not a purely theoretical matter). But it's pretty close to theoretical, because the client-side changes to switch from "do a PUT and know that it'll create a collection" to "do a MKCOL followed by a PUT" are trivial. > > > The restriction on PUT seems totally artificial anyway. A server that has > > > a problem to create missing collections is always allowed to forbid it. > > > But what is the point in forbidding all servers from doing that? > > > > Consistency. > > With what? Why is it important or beneficial in any way? Consistency with *itself*--it's important that a DAV client be able to know what's going to happen when it does a PUT. It also helps with access control: it allows an administrator to say, "Only these people can do MKCOL" and know that nobody else will be able to create collections. > Using DAV-like functionality of base HTTP/1.1 is one thing. Redefining that > functionality is another. I assert again that we are not redefining anything; that the changes you see are totally consistent with the HTTP/1.1 spec. > > > Another (not related) problem with the current protocol is the requirement > > > that servers must respect PROPFIND with Depth=infinity queries for collections. > > > > Access control. > > And this helps how? By making public content repositories outside the scope > of WebDAV? No, by requiring special access rights for Depth=infinity. -- /=============================================================\ |John Stracke | My opinions are my own | S/MIME & HTML OK | |francis@ecal.com|============================================| |Chief Scientist | NT's lack of reliability is only surpassed | |eCal Corp. | by its lack of scalability. -- John Kirch | \=============================================================/
Received on Monday, 19 April 1999 10:33:12 UTC