Hi Gavin,

For which case of:
- <lookup path> which is not rfc9082 3.1 lookup path (i.e. a search path or /help)
- lookup path with and object with more than one link of requested type?

PS. I am not a big fan of off-list discussion when the issue was brought up to the list. This is an adopted document.

Kind Regards,
Pawel

On 07.07.26 16:47, Gavin Brown wrote:
Hi Pawel,

Andy and I discussed this off-list, and the next version will revert back to 
400.

G.

On Sat, 4 Jul 2026, at 02:45, Pawel Kowalik wrote:
Hi Andy,

On 03.07.26 20:35, Andy Newton wrote:
On 7/3/26 10:58 AM, Pawel Kowalik wrote:
PK> 404 is imho the most appropriate response, especially if the answer
to the above is that certain searches are not supported (case b).
404 would be appropriate if there were no resources. But for searches where 
there is too much data, what is the right answer? The client formulated the 
query correctly and the data exists, it is just in a form that that would yield 
an unpredictable result.

Rereading the text, /help should yield a 501. That should be broken out into a 
separate rule IMHO.
PK2>  This is why I was asking, what "searches" means. If it is about
rfc9082 3.2 search path segments, than 404 is OK, because such resource
basically does not exist, as long as single result search is not
supposed to deliver a result.

Example of search, where imho 404 is appropriate:
https://example.com/rdap/redirects0_ref/related/domains?name=example*.com

Reading the draft again I see in Section 2 <base
URL>redirects0_ref/<relation>/<lookup path>, where <lookup path>
suggests to apply only to rfc9082 3.1. If this is right, text shall be
clear about it and the mention of /help should not be there at all,
because it's also not a lookup path.
In both cases 404 is also convenient for the implementation, because you
would map the route {base}/redirects0_ref/{relation}/domain/{name} and
not {base}/redirects0_ref/{relation}/domains/ or
{base}/redirects0_ref/{relation}/help - these would yield 404
automatically in the frameworks I know. To generate any other response
the path would need to be mapped, so 501 is not practical.

If the sentence is about the situation, where lookup query returns one
result, (e.g. http://rdap.example.com/ip/192.0.2.0/25) but contains more
than one link of a relation type (e.g. 2 "down" links in
http://rdap.example.com/redirects0_ref/down/ip/192.0.2.0/25), then 300
would be the best-fitting choice.
300 per rfc9110 should however deliver a list to choose from - rfc9264
can be helpful and appropriate here.

406 can be also an alternative - given a very broad interpretation of
"acceptable representation". Assuming that the client expects to receive
a Location URL and it cannot be given - maybe good enough.

Both of those choices are related to content negotiation in rfc9110, so
if one is of an opinion this is semantically too far, then 400 is likely
the only possible choice.

Kind Regards,
Pawel




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