I-D ACTION:draft-ietf-find-cip-soif-02.txt

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A Revised Internet-Draft is available from the on-line Internet-Drafts directories.
This draft is a work item of the Common Indexing Protocol Working Group of the IETF.

	Title		: CIP Index Object Format for SOIF Objects
	Author(s)	: M. Schwartz, D. Hardy, M. Bowman, E. Hardie, D. Wessels
	Filename	: draft-ietf-find-cip-soif-02.txt
	Pages		: 11
	Date		: 31-Oct-97
	
The Common Indexing Protocol (CIP) allows servers to form a referral
mesh for query handling by defining a mechanism by which cooperating
servers exchange hints about the searchable indices they maintain.  The
structure and transport of CIP are described in (Ref. 1), as are general
rules for the definition of index object types.  This document describes
SOIF, the Summary Object Interchange Format, as an index object type in
the context of the CIP framework.  SOIF is a machine-readable syntax for
transmitting structured summary objects, currently used primarily in the
context of the World Wide Web.
 
Query referral has often been dismissed as an ineffective strategy for
handling searches of Web resources, and Web resources certainly present
challenges not present in structured directory services like Rwhois.  In
situations where a keyword-based free text search is desired, query
referral is not likely to be effective because the query will probably
be routed to every server participating in the referral mesh.  Where a
search can be limited by reference to a specific resource attribute,
however, query referral is an effective tool.  SOIF can be used to
create such a known-attribute query mesh because it provides a method
for associating attributes with net-addressable resources.

Mic Bowman, Darren Hardy, Mike Schwartz, and Duane Wessels each
contributed to the creation of the SOIF format and to the descriptions
from which this draft is drawn; errors in this description of their work
are the responsibility of Edward Hardie and corrections should be
directed accordingly.


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