Title: user profile proposal
In the use case, the advanced encoding
provides additional information over and above the base “P3P”
information. Why re-encode it?
I would also not remove metadata about
profiles but would keep pretty much what we have, which I believe is enough to
agree on namespacing for the exchanged profile elements. [Note Subbu’s
comment on our aims here.]
Since the profile information is to be namespaced,
one can argue that it can be freely mixed, but I think a top level separation
has advantages and it’s quite cheap to provide it with the maxOccurs=”unbounded”
on the <profiles> element definition. Then both styles (mixed namespaces
or separated) can be used for user profiles.
Regards,
Andre
From: Michael Freedman [mailto:]
Sent: 30 August 2005 23:29
To: Andre Kramer
Cc:
Subject: Re: [wsrp-interfaces]
user profile proposal
On your answer to multiple profiles: I don't
understand the use case for this? What value is there in sending a
"common" format and a more sophisticated format when the consumer and
producer both support the sophisticaed format?
On your answer to extensions vs. things we define in the protocol: I am
happy to remove the [relatively] useless customUsiptioerProfileItemDescriptions
from serviceDescrn and customUserProfileData field from registrastionData so
that its clear that this is no different then any other extension that could be
supported.
-Mike-
Andre Kramer wrote:
Just to answer Mike’s questions: Yes, I propose to
allow multiple kinds of profiles. One use case would be allowing the common 1.0
P3P derived values to be transmitted along with a more sophisticated encoding
of additional user data.
I would agree the XML schema is
superficially similar but note that no <extensions> tag need be used in
order to allow the two communicating parties to exchange profile elements! And
that is how it should be for all explicit extension points we define in the
protocol, in my opinion.
Regards,
Andre
From: Michael Freedman [mailto:]
Sent: 24 August 2005 18:43
To:
Subject: Re: [wsrp-interfaces]
user profile proposal
Why did you define this so the producer can receive
multiple profiles? What is the use case for this? Where do we
expect consumers to manage/construct more then one?
Also, I find it interesting that in the end you have turned user profiles into
an extension. i.e. they have the same form. To me this is a step
backwards -- and instead I would prefer to continue to carry the P3P style user
profile formally in the UserContext as we did in 1.0 to reflect the fact that
this is the preferred/protocol profile and then tell consumers/producers that
decide to use a different profile to merely carry that profile in the extensions
field. This is especially true given your strong preference not to attempt to provide more meta data in the protocol related to
user profiles
-Mike-
Andre Kramer wrote:
The following
should allow alternative types of profile data to flow, making our old P3P
based information one example of such profile descriptions:
In 1.0 we had:
<complexType name="UserContext">
<sequence>
<element
name="userContextKey"
type="xsd:string" />
<element
name="userCategories"
type="xsd:string"
minOccurs="0"
maxOccurs="unbounded"
/>
<element
name="profile"
type="types:UserProfile"
minOccurs="0" />
<element
name="extensions"
type="types:Extension"
minOccurs="0"
maxOccurs="unbounded"
/>
</sequence>
</complexType>
<element name="UserContext" type="types:UserContext"
/>
Proposal: Replace "profile"
element in above with a "profiles"
element (note different type and that mulitple occurances are now allowed):
<element name="profiles" type="types:Profile"
minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="unbounded" />
Where the new
Profile type is defined as follows:
<complexType name="Profile">
<sequence>
<any
/>
</sequence>
</complexType>
We would also define a global "userProfile" element, as well as keep
the (P3P) UserProfile type in our
schema (could move UserProfile to separate useful types xsd):
<element name="userProfile" type="types:UserProfile"/>
This allows 0, 1 or many profiles to be communicated
in the user context in <profiles> elements. The understanding is that all
such profiles relate to the user. A specific usage is to communicate the 1.0 UserProfile data. This would now be
carried in an element named "profiles"
:
<userContext>
...
<profiles>
<userProfile> … 1.0 P3P stuff ...</userProfile> <!--
note that userProfile element is NOT required to be here but some XML is. -->
</profiles>
…
<extensions> …
</extensions> ...
</userContext>
Possible types of profiles can be listed using
ServiceDescription.customUserProfileItemDescriptions and RegistrationData.customUserProfileData. On
reflection, I strongly prefer not to attempt to provide more meta data in the
protocol related to user profiles. If a XML processor recognizes the namespaced
elements it will already have the schema (if defined).
Regards,
Andre
