Re: content negotiation anti-principle

At 8:09 AM +0900 1/2/03, Gavin Thomas Nicol wrote:
>Perhaps the real problem is that there's no easy way to force a particular
>representation to be returned? Content negotiation is at a lower level than
>remembered URL's, so there's some "gap" between the implied semantics and the
>actual protocol.

There are definitely times when I've wanted to point to a version of 
a resource in a particular language, or point to several translations 
in different languages, and not allow auto-content negotiation to 
happen. I've noticed that sites which use content-negotiation get in 
my way and make this difficult. Sites  that don't use content 
negotiation make this easy.

Again the whole issue of what is a resource rears its ugly head. Is 
it the abstract Platonic document which can be rendered into multiple 
languages? Or is it a particular, concrete representation of that 
document in one language? It really depends on what your local 
process is doing, doesn't it? Sometimes you want one. Sometimes you 
want the other.
-- 

+-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
| Elliotte Rusty Harold | elharo@metalab.unc.edu | Writer/Programmer |
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Received on Sunday, 5 January 2003 13:50:53 UTC