Sylvain Hellegouarch wrote: >[snip] >> What else, in your opinion makes them useless and counter productive? >> I'm seriously asking because I really don't see it. >> > > Well to me there is no need to include, or specify, information that > cannot be found otherwise already. >
Do you feel the same way about the link element's existing type, title, hreflang, and length attributes? > Specifying the way to find how to retrieve the replies resource is a great > idea and I'm looking forward to it. > > However, if I'm an aggregator I don't need the thr:count and thr:when > because I will find those information anyway with the following process: > > 1. I fetch the comment feed and put it my cache > 2. I want to know if a new comment has been posted, I won't fetch the feed > containing the entry but the feed containing the comment > a. No comment added => 304 Not Modified > B. A comment added => I fetch the feed again and know both the number > of comments and the date of the latest one > > This process will happen anyway from the aggregator point of view so I see > little value in the 'thr' attributes overall. > This boils down to an implementation choice. The thr attributes provide a way for UI's to display something before fetching the feed, which is often useful for an individual to decide whether or not it is even worthwhile to fetch to the comments feed in the first place. Also, consider that comment feeds may span multiple pages (using the paging link rels). With your algorithm (which, yes, is the only authoritative way of determining *exactly* how many comments have been received), you would have to retrieve every page and count up the comments. Considering also that feeds do not necessarily have to be ordered chronologically (tho most are) and that the feed may contain comments to multiple entries, getting a precise count of the total number of comments can be a time and resource consuming process that involves examining every individual entry in the feed for the presence of a matching in-reply-to link. Alternatively, you could decide to trust that the feed publisher may have already done all this work and has provided a reasonably accurate count in the form of the thr:count attribute. It's your choice. - James
