Re: [offlist] WebDAV Delete post (Flavors of DELETE)

"Clemm, Geoff" wrote:

> HTTP headers are a poor way of marshalling method specific
> information.  A header exists in a global namespace, and should be
> reserved for things that proxies need to look at.

It *might* be useful for a proxy to know that a resource has been moved
to a trash folder--it can update its cache.  On the other hand, looking
through the trash folder isn't going to be all that common.

Uh...ah! And the HTTP/1.1 definition of DELETE semi-forbids moving the
resource to a trash folder that can be accessed via HTTP:

     the server SHOULD NOT indicate success unless, at the time the
     response is given, it intends to delete the resource or move it
     to an inaccessible location.

(RFC-2616, section 9.7, first paragraph.)

> So if you want to extend DELETE, I would suggest following the
> standard WebDAV approach and add an XML request body to the DELETE
> method.

It might also be useful to have a response body, to indicate what action
was actually taken.

--
/==============================================================\
|John Stracke    | http://www.ecal.com |My opinions are my own.|
|Chief Scientist |=============================================|
|eCal Corp.      |"The avalanche has already started. It is too|
|francis@ecal.com|late for the pebbles to vote." --Kosh        |
\==============================================================/

Received on Tuesday, 10 April 2001 12:52:24 UTC