Re: [Uri-review] 'ftp' and 'file' URI schemes still needs specifying

[Mykyta Yevstifeyev <[e-mail]>]

15.05.2011 11:20, "Martin J. Dürst" wrote:
> Hello Mykyta,
>
> Providing specifications for ftp: and file: would indeed be a good 
> thing. But please be aware that besides the explicit publications you 
> found, there have also been other efforts to specify these schemes, 
> and they never got very far. Of the two, I'd guess ftp: is easier, but 
> I might be wrong. I definitely know that the file: scheme will be 
> tough; there is quite some variation among browsers, not to mention 
> other software, and it will be difficult to provide the right balance 
> between prescriptive and descriptive approach.
Thanks for response, Martin.  I recall some discussions on [e-mail] 
list regarding the 'file' URI scheme and can say it is really hard to 
specify it; that person who will undertake this work should probably 
spend a large amount of time on investigation of the issue and putting 
this on paper.  Maybe the difficulty is a great number of variants 
existing for file URIs, ie. absence of unified syntax, first of all.  
The situation is radically different with ftp; there is one well-known 
and widely-accepted syntax of it.  After we'll have defined these two 
schemes, it will make sense to change RFC 1738's status to Historic, 
considering anything of its content will be "shared" between other 
documents, but file URI scheme will be stumbling block here.

Mykyta Yevstifeyev
>
> Regards,   Martin.
>
> On 2011/05/15 14:14, Mykyta Yevstifeyev wrote:
>> Hello all,
>>
>> The first mention of 'ftp' URI scheme in the IETF document is probably
>> RFC 1738 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1738), if I'm right. As far as
>> you can see, this RFC is formally obsoleted by RFC 4248 and RFC 4266,
>> but in fact RFC 2396 et seq., meaning RFC 3986 (formally they updated
>> RFC 1738), replaced it. Among other, RFC 1738 document specified several
>> URI schemes, such as widely-used 'http', 'mailto' etc. This table
>> summarizes the state of schemes specified by RFC 1738. ("Specification"
>> is the most current RFC defining some scheme).
>>
>> /Scheme name
>> / /Protocol
>> / /Specification
>> /
>> http
>> HTTP (RFC2616)
>> RFC 2616
>> gopher
>> Gopher (RFC1436)
>> RFC 4266
>> mailto
>> N/A
>> RFC 6068
>> news
>> NNTP (RFC 3977)
>> RFC 5538
>> nntp
>> NNTP (RFC 3977)
>> RFC 5538
>> telnet
>> Telnet (RFC 854)
>> RFC 4248
>> wais
>> WAIS (RFC 1625)
>> RFC 4156
>> file
>> N/A
>> *RFC 1738*
>> prospero
>> Propsero (non-IETF)
>> RFC 4157
>> ftp
>> FTP (RFC 959)
>> *RFC 1738
>> *
>>
>> :
>> You may see, there are two schemes in this list specified by formally
>> obsoleted RFC 1738 (even though it is actually PS). They're probably the
>> only two schemes (not considering 'afs', but it's in provisional
>> regsitry) that are listed at IANA registry, in the Permanent category,
>> with a reference to obsoleted RFC (maybe, 'fax' can be considered to be
>> so as well; but is it de facto deprecated and hsitorical). 'ftp' and
>> 'file' schemes are quite widely-used; obsolete RFC 1738 is an actual
>> specification for them.
>>
>> There has been an effort to specify this schemes in separate docs.
>> (https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-hoffman-ftp-uri/,
>> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-hoffman-file-uri/), but they
>> resulted in nothing (unlike eg. RFC 4248, as a part of the same effort,
>> if I'm right). Considering this, should an attempt to provide these
>> schemes an up-to-date specification be undertaken?
>>
>> Mykyta Yevstifeyev
>>
>>
>>
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>