Re: ERB call on addressing

Peter Flynn <pflynn@curia.ucc.ie> wrote:
> LQ writes:
> 
> > feeling of the (then defunct!) HTML WG and others concerned was that ;
> > could reasonably be used instead.
> > 
> > Hence, ; is now used where & used to be used.
> 
> I haven't seen any browsers using it yet. My concern is that is we specify
> X and current software manufacturers carry on supporting Y, we may be in
> trouble.


RFC1866 sez:

[ from 8.2.1. The form-urlencoded Media Type ]
| [...]
|         2. The fields are listed in the order they appear in the
|         document with the name separated from the value by `=' and
|         the pairs separated from each other by `&'. [...]
| 
|             NOTE - The URI from a query form submission can be
|             used in a normal anchor style hyperlink.
|             Unfortunately, the use of the `&' character to
|             separate form fields interacts with its use in SGML
|             attribute values as an entity reference delimiter.
|             For example, the URI `http://host/?x=1&y=2' must be
|             written `<a href="http://host/?x=1&#38;y=2"' or `<a
|             href="http://host/?x=1&amp;y=2">'.
| 
|             HTTP server implementors, and in particular, CGI
|             implementors are encouraged to support the use of
|             `;' in place of `&' to save users the trouble of
|             escaping `&' characters this way.



In other words, _browsers_ are still supposed to use '&'
when they submit a form, but hand-written URIs representing 
"pre-filled-out forms" should use ';' instead.

Server-side form processors are supposed to accept both '&' and ';'.



--Joe English

  jenglish@crl.com

Received on Tuesday, 25 March 1997 14:36:45 UTC