Scott Orshan wrote:
> Beyond Forms, though, the display of a Web page is not necessarily
> idempotent
[I hope/assume/infer you're using the term "idempotent" as it was used
circa 1992-1994; the modern terminology is evidently "safe".
http://www.w3.org/Protocols/HTTP/1.1/draft-ietf-http-v11-spec-rev-06.txt.gz
]
> - it is not the same thing to retrieve it once as it is to
> retrieve it many times. There are simple statistics and counters that would
> become incorrect.
no crime there; such is life.
> Ads would be regenerated.
that's a tricky one... one that motivated the hit-counting
specs, I believe...
> You might repeat the
> shopping transaction that you just made.
Whoa! Stop right there! A site that uses GET to signal
execution of a transaction is just broken and antisocial.
I breaks search engines, web accelerators, and web
architecture and web social conventions altogether.
See http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/get
> The act of retrieving
> a Web page might cause some physical action to happen - zooming
> a camera or shifting a production line forward - not something you
> would want to repeat accidentally.
Then don't use GET. Period.
> I don't know if I've gotten all the nuances right, but I'm sure
> you get the general idea.
I think you've missed an important point.
--
Dan Connolly, W3C
http://www.w3.org/People/Connolly/
tel:+1-512-310-2971 (office, mobile)
mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (put your tel# in the Subject:)
