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Re: Solving the MIME type problem
On Thu, 17 Jun 2004 00:36:17 +0200, Bjoern Hoehrmann <derhoermi@xxxxxxx>
wrote:
Given that it is unlikely that everyone would upgrade their HTTP
server once the Atom specification is published as RFC, it seems
that we should ensure that common means to derive the Content-Type
header are timely prepared for Atom, where timely probably means
yesterday...
True.
How do we achieve that? Should someone of this group contact the
Apache Software Foundation to consider including an entry for
the Atom format in the next release of the Apache 2.x and 1.3.x
software packages?
Afaik, Sam Ruby is on the Jakarta Project Management Committee[1], so he
should have some saying on that point. But Apache isn't the only web
server on the web. I think it will be more difficult influencing the other
web server developers. Take IIS for example. How can we ever influence the
stuff Microsoft are doing with their web server?
If there is such a policy, would it make sense to ask for using
an experimental type like application/x-atom+xml until the type
is registered (which seems to be acceptable at least for the ASF)
I don't think so.
or should we split the MIME type registration into a seperate
document and move that to an RFC level ASAP?
Yes. We already know what the MIME type will and should be, so I see no
reason for waiting with this.
Would our charter allow that and would the IESG approve such a
document even if the format is not stable yet?
That would be up to IESG to answer, and I hope they do.
Which other software products should be considered here and how
to deal with them?
Probably all web-related software, especially web servers.
I think browsers might be a concern, for the W3C MarkUp Validator
it is common that browsers send an incorrect MIME type when using
the file upload functionality
I will start bugging the Opera developers about full Atom support when the
format settles a bit more. They have previously stated that they don't
wish to implement support for it until it is finished, but if we can
convince them some day in the future (before the spec is finished) that it
won't change much, they might do it.
I think Anne van Kesteren is a good advocate for Mozilla. I'm not sure if
we even should consider Internet Explorer. That piece of crap has enough
problems with supporting ordinary HTML and CSS.
If simply contacting the responsible organization, e.g. by filing
feature requests or bug reports, is the way to go here, are there
volunteers to take care of it?
I think both should work. If everyone could take some interest in getting
the products they use better, and using the contacts they have, much could
be done. The biggest problem are companies that aren't very open to user
input, like Microsoft. I have no idea how to get IIS to support Atom.
____
[1] <url: http://jakarta.apache.org/site/management.html>
--
Asbjørn Ulsberg -=|=- asbjornu@xxxxxxxxxxx
«He's a loathsome offensive brute, yet I can't look away»