Why does webconsole optionally imports org.osgi.service.http?

[Sahoo]

It is interesting to note that webconsole has an optional dependency on 
org.osgi.service.http. How can is expected to work in the absence of 
this package? The activator of webconsole bundle gets 
NoClassDefFoundError as shown below when there is no such package.

INFO: Caused by: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: 
org/osgi/service/http/HttpContext
Jun 9, 2009 1:55:52 PM 
INFO:   at 
org.apache.felix.webconsole.internal.OsgiManagerActivator.start(OsgiManagerActivator.java:35)
Jun 9, 2009 1:55:52 PM 
INFO:   at 
org.apache.felix.framework.util.SecureAction.startActivator(SecureAction.java:589)
Jun 9, 2009 1:55:52 PM 
INFO:   at org.apache.felix.framework.Felix.startBundle(Felix.java:1458)

Thanks,
Sahoo