Re: Identification of documents in Web applications

T.V Raman wrote:
> Some thoughts from the past:
> 
> ? and # are symmetric -- ? is server-side # is client-side. One
> of the inconsistencies in web-arch as defined is that it perhaps
> fail to recognize this symmetry fully.

That sentence alone is very clarifying :) - and as Jeni noted, 
developers are already using the two symmetrically, using paths and 
key=value pairs in fragments.

> Secondly, I believe there is a continuum from documents to
> applications, an application with 0 interactivity is perhaps a
> document. Another way to look at this is:
> 
> "The Document Is The Interface"  but "The Interface Is Not  A
> Document"  --- An interface is actually a collection of
> documents, where each document snapshots a particular state in
> the overall app;ication interaction.

This is a very interesting line of thought, so we could see the new 
twitter site (for example) as providing a document which may have 
potentially infinite states, and the server as providing a snapshot of 
that document in a state from which the others can be composed by the 
client (a continuation even), and fragments as being references to one 
of those composed states.

This would be a very useful and efficient pattern for clients, servers 
and the network; indeed without it each possible document state would 
need to be generated, stored and then referenced and cached around the 
web, which is almost infeasible.

I guess in to this comes references to composite resource state (as with 
the hash-bang cases and Ashok's hashInURIs write up).

One could say that both servers and clients now have an equal role in 
composing and controlling resource state, with resource representations 
over the wire being continuations. Perhaps it could be suggested that 
the universal interface works in both directions, hiding the 
implementation details on both sides, exposing only the interface and 
using resource identifiers and continuations with a well known media 
type to transfer state between components...

I'll stop here, but interesting to say the least..

Best,

Nathan

> Noah Mendelsohn writes:
>  > I've posted some thoughts at [1] on the identification of documents in Web 
>  > applications. This relates to the draft Ashok is editing on client-side 
>  > URIs [2](titled: "Repurposing the Hash Sign for the New Web", though one of 
>  > the points in my posting is that we need to look at "?" as well as "#", so 
>  > I'd really like to change that title.)
>  > 
>  > The posting also relates to the hash-bang #! controversy, and I'll be 
>  > scheduling a discussion of that for Thursday. Please try to read both my 
>  > posting [1] and Jeni's [3] before this week's call. Last I heard from Amy, 
>  > Tim will be joining us. I expect to do the agenda tomorrow morning.  Thank you.
>  > 
>  > Noah
>  > 
>  > [1] 
>  > http://blog.arcanedomain.com/2011/03/identifying-documents-in-web-applications/
>  > [2] http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/2011/02/HashInURI-20110208
>  > [3] http://www.jenitennison.com/blog/node/154
>

Received on Thursday, 10 March 2011 00:41:20 UTC