Re: XML Protocol LC issue 470 resolution

At 16:07 29/06/04 -0700, Mark Nottingham wrote:
>Graham,
>
>The XML Protocol Working Group has resolved issue 470 [1], regarding XOP's 
>use of media types.
>
>Regarding section 1.2: this was indeed a typo, and we will have it 
>corrected in the next draft.
...
>1. http://www.w3.org/2000/xp/Group/xmlp-lc-issues#x470

OK.

>Regarding section 5: we did consider such a solution, but it had the 
>drawback that the original media type
>would not be visible at the outer level using Multipart MIME.
>
>In other words, the multipart/related media type only allows a parameter 
>to identify the media type of the root part; any parameters of the root 
>part's media type must be discovered by examining the root part itself.
>
>Given this, we decided that the current design of XOP regarding media 
>types, while not optimal, was the best we could do within the limitations 
>of the MIME system.

Hmmm...

Multipart/related also has an optional Start-Info parameter:

[[
3.3.  The Start-Info Parameter

    Additional information can be provided to an application by the
    start-info parameter.  It contains either a string or points, via a
    content-ID, to another MIME entity in the message.  A typical use
    might be to provide additional command line parameters or a MIME
    entity giving auxiliary information for processing the compound
    object.

    Applications that use Multipart/Related must specify the
    interpretation of start-info.  User Agents shall provide the
    parameter's value to the processing application.  Processes can
    distinguish a start-info reference from a token or quoted-string by
    examining the first non-white-space character, "<" indicates a
    reference.
]]
-- http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2387.txt

Which it seems to me might be used to convey the desired information at the 
top level.  I suggest appropriate use of this parameter might be made 
mandatory when in conjunction with the a root type of (say) 
application/xop+xml, e.g.

Content-type: multipart/related
   ;type=application/xop+xml
   ;start=...
   ;start-info="original-content-type=application/soap+xml"

...

#g


------------
Graham Klyne
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http://www.ninebynine.org/#Contact

Received on Wednesday, 30 June 2004 15:25:05 UTC