Re: MUST a collection be returned as an Atom feed?

[Joe Gregorio <joe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Dec 28, 2009 at 11:32 AM, Jan Algermissen
<algermissen1971@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>
> On Dec 28, 2009, at 4:30 PM, Nikunj R. Mehta wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Dec 28, 2009, at 5:33 AM, Jan Algermissen wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> I have raised the following issue on rest-discuss in various forms
>>> already. Excuse me for bringing it up on this list again. I am just curious
>>> what people here think.
>>>
>>> RFC 5023 says:
>>> "Collection - A Resource that contains a set of Member Resources.
>>> Collections are represented as Atom Feeds."[1]
>>> Does that mean that an AtomPub server MUST be (at least) respond to a GET
>>> on a collection URI with an Atom feed
>>> representation?
>>>
>>> I am asking because I consider that to be too constraining. The client
>>> should not be able to make such an assumption. It should discover at runtime
>>> that the response is application/atom+xml rather than expect it to be prior
>>> to the request.
>>
>> In other words is there room for conneg when requesting a collection? Is
>> that the intended purpose of your question?
>>
>
> Rephrasing the question:
>
> Whay is the sentence "Collections are represented as Atom Feeds" in RFC
> 5023?
>
> Is it a MUST requirement for AtomPub servers?

Yes.

>
> (Or a SHOULD or a hint to client developers?)
>
>
> Or, rephrasing again:
>
> Could the sentence "Collections are represented as Atom Feeds" be removed
> from RFC 5023 without consequences?

No it could not be removed, RFC 5023 is the Atom Publishing Protocol, it's about
publishing using Atom Feed and Entry documents.

You could remove it and let the client try to guess the media-type
of the resources, or work with a range of media-types, such as JSON, HTML
and Atom, which might be an interesting experiment, but it wouldn't be AtomPub.

   Thanks,
   -joe

>
>
> Why is it in there at all?
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>
>
> Jan
>
> P.S. I am using that sentence as a stripped down example of a point I am
> trying to make. No intention to discuss/question RFC 5023 in particular.
>
>
>
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>
>> Nikunj Mehta
>> http://blog.o-micron.com
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
> --------------------------------------
> Jan Algermissen
>
> Mail: algermissen@xxxxxxx
> Blog: http://algermissen.blogspot.com/
> Home: http://www.jalgermissen.com
> --------------------------------------
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