Re: Ambiguities in header-field rules (p1-messaging)

[Frank Mertens <[e-mail]>]

On 08/18/2011 05:16 AM, Amos Jeffries wrote:
> On Wed, 17 Aug 2011 19:58:21 +0200, Frank Mertens wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I played around with the ABNF published by this WG and stumbled
>> over some rough edges.
>>
>> Current rules:
>>
>> OWS = *( [ obs-fold ] WSP )
>> header-field = field-name ":" OWS [ field-value ] OWS
>> field-value = *( field-content / OWS )
>> field-content = *( WSP / VCHAR / obs-text )
>>
>> Problems:
>>
>> - field-value and field-content match the empty symbol,
>> which requires searching for the longest match, which is costly
>> (and confusing for the human reader)
>> - because field-value matches the empty symbol claiming it optional
>> in header-field allows ambiguous productions of same length
>> (with or without field-value of zero length?)
>>
>> Suggested improvement:
>>
>> field-value = 1*( field-content OWS )
>> field-content = 1*( VCHAR / WSP / obs-text )
>>
>> Best Regards,
>> Frank Mertens.
>
>
> The OWS on header-field remains ambiguous as well.
>
> Also, with WSP being in field-content there is the possibility of header-field matching:
>
> field-name ":" [ obs-fold ] 1*( WSP OWS ) OWS
>
> Nasty. But section 3.2 comes to the rescue:
> "The field value does not include any leading or trailing white space"
> and
> "HTTP/1.1 senders MUST NOT produce messages that include line folding"
>
> So OWS in the field-value ABNF appears to be invalid in several ways going by the text.
>
>
> Perhapse this would be better:
>
> header-field = field-name ":" [ WSP ] BWS [ field-value ]
> field-value = 1*( field-content BWS )
> field-content = 1*( VCHAR / WSP / obs-text )
>
>
>
>
> Nit: section 1.2.2 currently says:
>
> "Multiple OWS octets that occur within field-content
> SHOULD be replaced with a single SP before interpreting the field
> value or forwarding the message downstream."
> ...
> "Multiple RWS octets that occur within field-content SHOULD be
> replaced with a single SP before interpreting the field value or
> forwarding the message downstream.
> "
>
> When there is no OWS or RWS in the field-content ABNF.
>
> I think both should say header-field instead of field-content. Or maybe drop the "within field-content" condition to make it general.
>
>
> AYJ
>
>

Yes, maybe we should also have a strict version of the grammar.
But for now, I'm happy with a working tolerant one;)
Replacing OWS by BWS would also disable support for line folding.

FM