Re: URL semantics

[Tim Berners-Lee <[e-mail]>]

At 11:27 am 09-01-97 -0600, Daniel LaLiberte wrote:
>Larry Masinter writes:

>But for all URLs (and URNs, if they may be distinguished), the URL
>identifies the interaction.  In the case of *some* URLs, the
>interaction results in a data object, so it only *seems* that the URL
>identifies the data object, but that is an indirect effect.

I  completely disagree.  The URL identifies the object.  That is
fundamental to the concept of the web. The web is a web of
quasi static resources, not a set of operations, as base.  This
is essential architecturally and from the UI point of view.

How a given browser, desktop, etc, behaves when you activate the
reference to an object is (mercifully) controllable by the user, just as in
W95
one can chose a default operation on double-click on an icon.
When you refer to a book, I can chose to buy it or get it from the library.

If you wanted to make something which contains an interaction, some
operation, then you would need a language in which resource identifiers
were a part.  But there are many languages for that, and there can be many
more.  (A frameset is one, a form is another, Java is another.)

Tim

PS: Above I use "object" to be consistent with the thread, I should
use "resource".