Forwarding from Phil: Is it a problem that the XDI # symbol will conflict with URI # fragment char?

Phil was not sure if this message reached the list.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Phil Windley <>

Date: Tue, Mar 4, 2014 at 4:33 PM
Subject: Re: Is it a problem that the XDI # symbol will conflict with URI # fragment char?
To: =Drummond Reed <>, OASIS - XDI TC <>, Drummond Reed <>

Not by me. I’ve long felt that the perceived need to keep XDI statements within the URL syntax was a significant source of notational complexity and contributed to XDI’s contorted syntax. I understand the need for the 5 or 6 years ago. I think that need has diminished greatly and XDI could be made more readable by dropping the idea the XDI statements need to be erodible as URLs altogether. 

 

 

From: =Drummond Reed 

Reply: =Drummond Reed 
Date: March 4, 2014 at 5:18:50 PM
To: OASIS - XDI TC 

Subject:  Is it a problem that the XDI # symbol will conflict with URI # fragment char? 

 

As part of coming to a final decision about The
Great Symbol Swap, I just had a long talk with Peter about his -1
vote. His primary concern is one I share: as attractive as # might
be as the popular symbol for a hashtag—and thus generally
applicable to the XDI dictionary space—it is also the URL fragment
identifier.

This means that when it is typed in a URL, the browser does
not send it to the server, but only processes it locally in
parsing the returned resource.

So if we expect users to type #words (unescaped) as part of an
XDI address into a browser address bar (without a plug-in), they
will not be part of the XDI address sent to the server.

This is not a problem if we assume some form of XDI-aware
smart client will be used to resolve XDI addresses (e.g., a browser
plug-in, a web form submitted to an XDI resolver, a mobile app,
etc.), as then all XDI addresses will be automatically
URL-encoded.

So, I cast this question out to TC members: is this a problem
you are concerned about or not?

=Drummond

On Tue, Mar 4, 2014 at 5:22 AM, Davis,
Peter <> wrote:

-1. 

I remain concerned that we are just relocating the semantic
collision from @ to # (both have meanings to the general population
outside of XDI).

=peterd

On Mar 4, 2014, at 03:06 AM, Markus Sabadello <> wrote:

+1

On Tue, Mar 4, 2014 at 8:46 AM, =Drummond
Reed <> wrote:

Per the minutes I just sent out, I have continued to
check with both XDI TC members and others involved in
related infrastructure with the following results:

There is unanimous support for reassigning + to the
legal/business authority namespace (formerly represented by
@).

There is nearly unanimous support for reassigning # to the
dictionary namespace (formerly represented by +) and
reassigning @ to the ordered collection member namespace (formerly
represented by #).

So this is a call for rough consensus, i.e.:

If you agree with the proposed reassignments in the two bullet
points above, reply with a +1.

If you are neutral, reply with a 0 (or don't reply).

If you disagree with these proposed reassignments, reply
with a -1.

Thanks,

=Drummond  

Peter Davis: Neustar, Inc.

Distinguished
Engineer, Director, Neustar Foundry

45980 Center Oak Plaza Sterling,
VA 20166

[T] +1 571 434 5516 [E]  [W] http://www.neustar.biz/ [X]
xri://@neustar*pdavis [X]
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