Konqueror WebDAV integration question

[Bert Bos]

On Wednesday 07 September 2005 15:23, Julian Reschke wrote:
> Thiago Macieira wrote:

> > If that is so, this proposal of yours will allow the servers to
> > tell clients, but it doesn't allow one other benefit of the
> > "webdav" scheme we use in KDE: allow the user to decide.
[...]
> 1) Well, I agree it may be useful; and I didn't propose to take that
> away. On the other hand, this is an unregistered URI scheme, and it
> only exists one one particular platform.
>
> 2) The whole point of this format is that you don't have to go
> through these steps manually; instead just click on a link and the
> WebDAV view of things will open, no matter what platform you are on.

I agree with Julian that there should be a standard solution, a way to 
link to a document on a WebDAV server that does not depend on the 
browser you are using.

But Julian's solution (a davmount file with a single HTTP URL in it) 
seems rather less practical than KDE's (a "webdav:" URI scheme). 
Julian's solution requires you to make an extra file, just to be able 
to attach a second MIME type to a document that already has one.

It also requires an extra round-trip to the server: first to get the 
small file, then to get the actual document.

And WebDAV is a protocol, so a URI scheme definitely feels more natural 
than a MIME type.

Julian mentions W3C's Web Architecture document[1] in his ID[1]. W3C 
indeed says that you should not unnecessarily make new URI schemes 
(because it is costly, all Web software will have to be updated). But:

  1) A new MIME type is just as costly.

  2) Existing URI schemes and MIME types do not provide what's needed.

So in my view, it is acceptable to create a new URI scheme in this case.

(One caveat: I know very little about WebDAV, even though W3C has 
implemented a server and I'm using it every once in a while.)


As W3C's document also says: don't use URI schemes without 
registering[3] them with IANA! So the ideal solution, in my mind, would 
be if Julian and the inventors of "webdav:" got together and submitted 
a specification for a URI scheme to the IETF.

[1] 
http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-reschke-webdav-mount-00.txt
[2] http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-webarch-20041215/
[3] http://www.iana.org/assignments/uri-schemes



Bert
-- 
  Bert Bos                                ( W 3 C ) http://www.w3.org/
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