RE: BIND vs. non-movable resources in RFC3253

The purpose of a stable URL for a version and a version
history is to guarantee that that URL will always identify
that resource.  This provides the client with two benefits:

The first is that it can just pass that URL around
and not have to worry about getting the wrong
resource because that URL has been remapped to another
resource.

The second is to give the client a "reliable" way to locate
the resource (i.e. a mapping that only goes away when the
resource no longer exists).

I believe the second benefit is worth the added complexity
of saying "the stable binding cannot be deleted if there
are multiple entries in the DAV:parent-set".

Whether or not this is a a significant benefit of course
depends on whether your client takes advantage of it, but I
think the cost is minimal, especially since these kinds of
bindings are already constrained to never be remapped to
another resource.

Cheers,
Geoff
 

-----Original Message-----
From: Julian Reschke [mailto:julian.reschke@gmx.de]
Sent: Monday, October 21, 2002 12:57 PM
To: Clemm, Geoff; 'Webdav WG'
Subject: RE: BIND vs. non-movable resources in RFC3253


> From: w3c-dist-auth-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-dist-auth-request@w3.org]On
> Behalf Of Clemm, Geoff
> Sent: Monday, October 21, 2002 6:37 PM
> To: 'Webdav WG'
> Subject: RE: BIND vs. non-movable resources in RFC3253
>
>
> It is also desireable that a client be able to use
> the original URL as long as that resource exists.

But why? It *is* allowed to delete the resource, so there's no guarantee
that the version/VHR will be kept eternally. From a client's point of view,
it's completely irrelevant whether it's getting the 404 because the resource
was deleted or because it was moved.

> Stefan's proposal ensures that is the case.

Yes, but it makes the model more complicated with little benefit. Forbidding
a DELETE on a binding just because other bindings continue to exist seems to
contradict the intent of the BIND spec. Therefore I'd like to see better
reasons why we really need that. In doubt, we should *simplify* things, not
make them more complicated.

Julian

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