Re: Subset display in dir index (was: Auto download...)

rdenny@netcom.com (Robert Denny)
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Date: Mon, 30 May 1994 03:55:43 +0200
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From: rdenny@netcom.com (Robert Denny)
To: Multiple recipients of list <www-talk@www0.cern.ch>
Subject: Re: Subset display in dir index (was: Auto download...)
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> >[me... explaining what the NCSA and CERN servers do now]
> >I don't see the benefit in hiding the file name in a directory listing.
>
> [...] 
> Meaningless to most users, right?  That's what my generated filenames look
> like.  I'm suggesting that if the client requests a directory list *.htm,
> the default would be to a document back that looks something back like
> this:
> 
> <title>Directory of myhost.mydomain.com/mydirectory/*.htm</title>
> 
> <ul>
> <li><a href="http://myhost.mydomain.com/mydirectory/83499A.htm">This is the
> title of the first file</a>
> [...etc.]

Yes, I understand. You want the file name hidden, and a textual title to
replace the file name in the directory index as the hot-spot.

> I'm suggesting that perhaps something like this should be the *default*
> behavior, so that the default deals with information that's intended in all
> cases to be meaningful to the user.  I have no objections to allowing other
> behaviors, including returning the file names.

Where would we get the titles for the (non HTML) files? This could be a
daunting task on a large library. The current servers don't prevent
information "meaningful to the user" from being displayed, they just don't
require it. You can set up a title for a file, if you dont, and it's HTML,
the server will extract the title automatically and show it, else no
description is shown, just the file name. In this case, it is the choice of
the system administrator. I prefer the laissez faire approach.

At this point, being a server developer, I am going to bow out of the
discussion. I will implement that which is deemed "right".

    -- Bob