Re: [whatwg] New URL Standard from Anne van Kesteren on 2012-09-24 ([e-mail] from September 2012)

[Julian Reschke <[e-mail]>]

On 2012-10-22 23:46, Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Oct 2012, Julian Reschke wrote:
>>>
>>> I couldn't agree more! We've been waiting for four years for the URI
>>> working group to get their act together and fix the URL mess. Nothing
>>> has happened. We lost patience and are now doing it ourselves. ...
>>
>> Clarifying: there is no URI Working Group, and as far as I can tell,
>
> Whoever. The people complaining that it should be done at the IETF haven't
> done any work. That's the complaint. Until they do the work, complaining
> that we're doing it instead is going to fall on deaf ears and be met with
> the rolling of eyeballs.

This always was about venue, not people. If people want to "fix" or 
"augment" URIs/IRIs, they should come over to the IETF. That's where the 
specs live. The IETF is open to anyone, works async on mailing lists, 
and doesn't require any membership fees. I don't think there's any 
standards body that is *more* open to individuals.

But yes, you may have to convince a few people outside the WhatWG. 
That's a feature. It means more review from people outside the browser 
ecosystem.

>> there is no consensus that there is a "mess" to fix related to URIs.
>
> The specs don't define everything that implementations have to do to be
> interoperable. If the IETF doesn't think that's a problem, then that's
> fine, but then y'all shouldn't be surprised when people who _do_ think
> that's a problem try and fix it.

Yes, please fix *that*, but *just* that without messing with the basics 
without consensus/review.

So yes: if you feel you need to make \ to equivalent to /, that may be 
ok (as \ isn't valid anyway). But changing the reference resolution 
algorithm for valid URI/reference pairs is something entirely different. 
*If* it needs to be done, it needs to be done within the scope of the 
URI spec.

Best regards, Julian