Re: Handling unknown elements in an entry

[Robert Sayre <mint@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dare Obasanjo wrote:
> --- Ezra Cooper <ezra@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > But Rob raises the question: how to express the
> > deletion of an element. I'm
> > not sure. Is there ever a difference between
> > "element X is not in the entry"
> > and "element X has an empty value"? 
>
>
> Yes. 

OK. We have three scenarios here--

 1.) Client omits element and thus deletes it. (woops?)
 2.) Client omits/changes element, but the server doesn't allow it, and
     re-inserts it.
 3.) Client omits/changes element, but the server doesn't allow it, and
     returns a 4xx error.

I think we need to warn about #1, since it will seem strange to an 
RPC-oriented developer.

I also think we need to explain when #2 is preferable to #3. For 
example, 6A code will give you a 4xx error if you try to post with a 
category that doesn't exist on your blog. That feels about right to me, 
but we need to reconcile it with the need to drop stuff on the floor.

Robert Sayre