Re: Globalizing URIs

Gavin Nicol (gtn@ebt.com)
Thu, 3 Aug 95 10:45:24 EDT

>How the http server for www.jacme.co.jp decides to translate strings
>into files in its local file system is COMPLETELY up to the

True.

>The URL standard makes no claims about the mapping of URLs to anything
>at all in the local file system of the local operating system. It
>defines how URLs are written, and how URLs are translated into
>sequences of octets that are sent in the protocol for the particular
>scheme chosen.

True.

> http://www.jacme.co.jp/[EUC]%B0%F5%BA%FE.html
>
>This convention requires no changes to the HTTP or URL standards.

Well, this is where we disagree. I think there should be a *standard*
way to send this information, so as such, the *standard* does require
changing. I don't mind where the information is put, but one reason
for preferring:

http:[EUC]//www.jacme.co.jp/%B0%F5%BA%FE.html

over

http://www.jacme.co.jp/[EUC]%B0%F5%BA%FE.html

is that the latter could very will be a legal name within the system,
leading to ambiguity. In other words, the information about coded
character set and encoding must be separated from the name itself,
because *any* representation of the information could be legal in the
context of a name (as you mention, anything is legal here).