RE: Speifying mechanisms

["Mark Birbeck" <mark.birbeck@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Greg,

> > (Note also that WWW-Authenticate is protocol dependent, which -- so 
> >far --  much of Atom is not.)
> 
> The Atom publishing protocol *is* HTTP specific. Completely. 
> I haven't heard of any desire nor attempt to deal with 
> protocols other than HTTP. So I'd suggest that being 
> "specific" is not a problem.

OK .... I'd like to see Atom less protocol-dependent. ;)

Many of the services around at the moment already offer the ability to blog
via email, for example. How is that specified in Atom? From what you've
said, it just isn't. Anyone that offers such a feature simply 'steps
outside' of the Atom protocol. That doesn't bode well for the future, as
people add blogging via mobile phone, email, SMS messages, or whatever.
Surely we need to be able to express end-points dynamically?

As of today, our XForms processor can already 'submit' XML documents in many
different ways from the same form, including via SMTP. So, we could easily
extend our formsPlayer blogging client demo to send updates via email by a
simple change in the submission element -- no additional code. Except we
can't, because we currently could not get the end-point information at
run-time, and so would need to hard-code the email address.

I realise it's not completely trivial to add such a feature, but I suggest
it's worth considering how dependent Atom should be on HTTP if Atom is to
fulfil its promise.

Regards,

Mark


Mark Birbeck
CEO
x-port.net Ltd.

e: Mark.Birbeck@xxxxxxxxxx
t: +44 (0) 20 7689 9232
w: http://www.formsPlayer.com/

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