Re: [Ietf-message-headers] Packaging, was: provisional registration: packaged content over http (5 headers)

[Richard Jones <[e-mail]>]

Hi Julian,

On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 at 9:05 AM, Julian Reschke <[e-mail]>wrote:

> On 2012-01-17 09:44, Graham Klyne wrote:
>
>> ...
>> [[
>> The Packaging header applies to resources delivered over HTTP which are
>> comprised of component resources, and is for uniquely identifying these
>> well structured packaged objects in a similar way that Content-Type does
>> for MIME formats.
>> ]]
>>
>> I think this would be a good opportunity to canvas for information about
>> whether any other projects are addressing similar issues w.r.t.
>> conveying information about packaging or composite object formats in
>> HTTP. I'm pretty sure this isn't a one-off problem.
>>
>
> +1
>

Is this something we can do through this or another IETF list?


>
>  Packaging doesn't really fall into the role of a content-type, as it
>> doesn't say anything about the nature of purpose of the packaged
>> content. But it also is not really a content transfer encoding, as it
>> may convey application-relevant metadata in addition to simply encoding
>> content for transfer.
>>
>> The nearest I can think of that has been addressed in the IETF is the
>> MHTML work from some years ago, which uses multipart/related structures
>> to bundle up the content of a web page
>> (http://tools.ietf.org/html/**rfc2557<http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2557>).
>> But that doesn't really work in
>> this case, as SWORD and related applications are already using a number
>> of alternative formats that don't easily map into a multipart/related or
>> similar MIME encapsulation structure.
>>
>> [[
>> The Packaging request header SHOULD be used by the client during HTTP
>> POST to give information to the server about the packaging format used
>> to construct the content being POSTed or PUT. Servers SHOULD use this
>>
>
> POST *and* PUT?
>

Yes.  The use case is that if you've POSTed a package before, you might
want to replace it, so you could PUT a new package (potentially in a
different format) to the original package URI.



>
>  information to unpack the supplied content into its component parts. If
>> the server does not understand the package format it MUST either store
>> the content as delivered without unpacking or respond with 415
>> (Unsupported Media Type).
>> ]]
>>
>
> No. 415 is for unsupported media types.
>

Ok, interesting; what response should be returned?



>
>  It is not clear from this text that the SHOULD here applies to
>> implementations of SWORD. For the header specification document, I think
>> it would be better to avoid such normative claims about its use, which
>> might be read as claiming that any HTTP client SHOULD use the header.
>> e.g. just say "The Packaging request header may be used by a client ..."
>>
>
> From the description in the spec it's not clear to me at all how this is
> supposed to work, and why it is needed in addition to the Content-Type. I'm
> sure there's a reason, but it really would be good to add more explanations.
>

The main issue is that Content-Type is for the mimetype, which would be
something like application/zip, whereas the Packaging header allows us to
define what is inside the zip; for example, it may by a BagIt, or a METS
package, or such?

Do you imagine a way in which the packaging could be included in the
Content-Type?  We did look into Media Formats, but their general adoption
level seemed quite low, and this approach felt simpler.

Cheers,

Richard