IPP Mail Archive: IPP> Content-disposition: A better place for command verbs?

IPP> Content-disposition: A better place for command verbs?

Harald.T.Alvestrand@uninett.no
Thu, 09 Oct 1997 14:06:10 +0200

Hi,
as some of you know, I've been somewhat worried about the recent trend
to try to define MIME types that have more or less the same content
(or even no content), but different names, because they indicate
different things that the sender wants the recipient to do.

Recently, an I-D crossed my desk: draft-rfced-exp-whalen-00.txt
Now the actual draft is quite dangerous, because it confuses
"program name" with "desired function", effectively making it just too
easy to create an "execute anything" facility without intending to.
But the basic idea might have a point:

*> Architecturally, I think the "command verb" part fits better as a <*
*> content-disposition modifier than as a MIME type. <*

So - it SHOULD be possible to define a content-disposition modifier
that is adequately narrow, for instance:

Content-type: application/job-id
Content-disposition: process; proto=3Dipp; request=3Dreturn-status

Content-type: appication/event
Content-disposition: process; proto=3Dimip; request=3Dcounteroffer

Content-type: index/cip-tokenized-index-delta
Content-disposition: process; proto=3Dcip; request=3Dmerge

I know that several of you are quite far along the track already, and may=

not want to rethink the usage you make of MIME types, but I think it's wo=
rth
spending at least 3 minutes thinking about where you put the "command ver=
b".

Have fun!

Harald A