Proposal on use of HTTP Versions

On today's TBTF call, I took an action item to propose text clarifying the
intended use of our HTTP binding with various versions of HTTP.  Here is a
proposed replacement for the first paragraph of section 7.1:

<original>
The SOAP HTTP Binding presented here provides a binding of SOAP to HTTP.
This binding conforms to the SOAP Binding Framework (see [1]SOAP Protocol
Binding Framework) and uses abstract properties as a descriptive tool for
defining the functionality of certain features.
</original>

<proposed>
The SOAP HTTP Binding presented here provides a binding of SOAP to HTTP.
This binding conforms to the SOAP Binding Framework (see [1]SOAP Protocol
Binding Framework) and uses abstract properties as a descriptive tool for
defining the functionality of certain features.  This bind SHOULD be
deployed using HTTP Version 1.1 [ref to RFC 2068].  This binding MAY be
used with future versions of HTTP that may be developed as backward
compatible replacements for HTTP Version 1.1.  This binding does not
normatively provide for the use of HTTP Version 1.0 [ref to RFC 1945].
</proposed>

Note: this is slightly less elaborate than what I had proposed on the phone
regarding the use of HTTP 1.0.  On the phone, I had suggested a note that
would go into some detail describing the subsets of the binding (e.g. no
content negotiation) that could not normatively be used.  In drafting this
text, it seemed to me more straightforward to not devote a lot of detail to
behavior that is not formally part of the specification anyway.  If anyone
does feel we should be more explicit, then I would propose the following:

<alternateProposal>
The SOAP HTTP Binding presented here provides a binding of SOAP to HTTP.
This binding conforms to the SOAP Binding Framework (see [1]SOAP Protocol
Binding Framework) and uses abstract properties as a descriptive tool for
defining the functionality of certain features.  This bind SHOULD be
deployed using HTTP Version 1.1 [ref to RFC 2068].  This binding MAY be
used with future versions of HTTP that may be developed as backward
compatible replacements for HTTP Version 1.1.  NOTE: Although this binding
does not normatively provide for the use of HTTP Version 1.0 [ref to RFC
1945], a useful subset of this binding is compatible with HTTP 1.0.  For
example, requests and responses can generally be sent as described herein,
but HTTP 1.1 content negotiation is not possible.
</alternateProposal>

------------------------------------------------------------------
Noah Mendelsohn                              Voice: 1-617-693-4036
IBM Corporation                                Fax: 1-617-693-8676
One Rogers Street
Cambridge, MA 02142
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Received on Thursday, 2 May 2002 19:14:07 UTC