Re: Compatibility between HTML, XForms, and WSDL

On Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 02:10:11AM +0000, Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Thu, 24 Feb 2005, Eric Prud'hommeaux wrote:
> >
> > HTML4.01 (and probably XHTML, though I didn't find it) specifies that
> > a GET URI is constructed as such:
> >   action + '?' + url-encoded form parameters
> > 
> > An cursory implementation survey showed that Lynx 2.8.4, Opera 7.5.4,
> > Mozilla 1.7.5 all appear to chop off the '?' and everything after it.
> >   <http://q.example/what?inference=owl-lite&q=SELECT%20%3>
> > 
> > WSDL [WZ] follows XForms's [XF] example and specifies that the
> > separator between the action and the parameters be a '?' if there is
> > not one already, otherwise, a '&' .
> >   <http://q.example/what?foo&inference=owl-lite&q=SELECT%20%3>
> > 
> > I propose an errata to HTML to reflect either current practice or the
> > XForms way of doing it. I will propose that the SPARQL protocol [SP]
> > use the XForms approach as well.
> 
> One advantage of the current practice is that if the action is "" then you 
> don't end up adding more and more arguments:
> 
>    <form action="">
>     <p><input type="submit" name="test" value="test"></p>
>    </form>
> 
> The first click would return
> 
>    http://www.example.com/q?test=test
> 
> With the current practice of HTML UAs, a second click returns the same 
> thing. With the other proposal, you would get:
> 
>    http://www.example.com/q?test=test&test=test
> 
> ...then:
> 
>    http://www.example.com/q?test=test&test=test&test=test
> 
> ...and so forth.

Good point, that is an advantage. But what do we do about it? It
violates both the HTML spec and the XForms spec. What I'd like to see
is a uniform policy between HTMLs and XForms, perhaps as an errata to
one or both.  What policy they choose is largely immaterial to me;
they all have their strengths and weaknesses.

What path do you think best?
-- 
-eric

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