[Fwd: Re: PUT vs strong ETags]

(fyi)

-------- Original Message --------

Wilfredo Sánchez Vega wrote:
>   Question for you.
> 
>   Apache HTTPD emits a weak etag for a file resource if the timestamp on 
> the file is the same as the current time (one second accuracy) and a 
> strong etag otherwise.
> 
>   The reason for that logic, as I understand it, is that because the 
> etag generation depends on the timestamp and that the file may change 
> multiple times within a one-second period, an etag generated from a 
> timestamp matching the current time isn't reliable.

Finally a good explanation.

>   But your post caused me to re-read the spec, and this logic doesn't 
> seem consistent with the spec.  The weak etag would be the same for all 
> changes in a one-second period but the documents may not be semantically 
> similar.  So that seems like a bug.  Perhaps HTTPD should instead omit 
> the etag in that case, since the etag isn't weak; it's simply not 
> correctly calculable using the timestamp.
> 
>   That sound right?

I think this is correct, and getting this question answered is essential
on how the working group tackles the various (new) ETag issues in
RFC2518bis.

May I forward this mail to the WebDAV mailing list?

Best regards, Julian

Received on Tuesday, 29 November 2005 21:14:02 UTC