Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[okamoto]

Sorry, my mistake.

Aha-
Tact sucks = ざけんな、こらぁ!

I don't want to disturb natives who want to enjoy colorfull
conversations.   So, don't take it so seriously.   However, if
possible please remeber that sometime...

Anyway, what means fera tact?   I don't see both of fera and tact,
sorry.  :-)

Kenji

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Charles Forsyth]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 334 bytes --]

that certainly wasn't the point of my own remark.

there are two distinct things:

1. trying to interface to WebDAV
2. WebDAV itself.

the target of my somewhat despairing remark was (2).  (1) is quite understandable
if you must deal with webDAV anyway.  hence the existence of
ftpfs(4), webfs(4), nfsserver(8), and others.

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 1704 bytes --]

From: Peter Downs <ragnar@ragnartech.net>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 2002 12:38:35 -0600
Message-ID: <20021104183835.GB6601@ragnartech.net>

summary: webdavfs, why bother?  Tack sucks.

peter

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Skip Tavakkolian]

> Tack sucks.

Pity; Sailing wouldn't be the same without it.  ☺

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Skip Tavakkolian]

I thought the irony was obvious enough that I didn't need the smiley
face.

Honestly, you need to chill.

>> Anyway, use of colloquialism or slang in an international forum just
>> sticks in my craw and is as useless as balls on heifer.
>
> Then don't do it, don't get involved in such discussions. But it
> demonstrates a certain lack of respect to dis other people who seem
> comfortable with it. As to utility, I don't think your individual opinion
> should be forced on others. Do you? How would you like -me- making such
> decisions about -you-?

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Peter Downs]

summary: webdavfs, why bother?  Tack sucks.

peter

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Dan Cross]

> Tack sucks.

Yeah.  I hate stepping on them.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[okamoto]

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
--upas-zfkxybzpktiapsewmxbfgeuomz
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Aha-
Tact sucks = ざけんな、こらぁ!

I don't want to disturb natives who want to enjoy colorfull
conversations.   So, don't take it so seriously.   However, if
possible please remeber that sometime...

Anyway, what means fera tact?   I don't see both of fera and tact,
sorry.  :-)

Kenji

--upas-zfkxybzpktiapsewmxbfgeuomz
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From: Jim Choate <ravage@einstein.ssz.com>
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Subject: Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system
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On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 okamoto@granite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp wrote:

> >Tact sucks.
> >
> >-rob
>
> I must say I can't follow your native speaker's English anymore.   ;_;
> Please, if possible, remember there is a foreigner who's native language
> is not English...
>
> Sorry making noise.

Zakennayo, fera tact.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

--upas-zfkxybzpktiapsewmxbfgeuomz--

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 okamoto@granite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp wrote:

> Anyway, what means fera tact?   I don't see both of fera and tact,
> sorry.  :-)

Fera is Japanese street slang for a blowjob (at least it is in parts of
Tokyo). Tact sucks. See? I see that zakennayo works in Osaka just fine ;)

It was my understanding that Japanese was backward from English, perhaps
it should be 'tact fera'...<shrug>. I have zero idea what 'tact' is in
Japanese and I'm way too lazy to go for the dictionary ;)

For something completely on topic - is there any sort of translation
packages that work in Plan 9? In particular Spanish, German, French,
Russian, or Chinese? Babblefish'ist? I'm in the process of doing a Chinese
and Russian word drill program for Apache. Are there similar toys in Plan
9?

Zai jian.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Skip Tavakkolian]

>> Anyway, what means fera tact?   I don't see both of fera and tact,
>> sorry.  :-)
>
> Fera is Japanese street slang for a blowjob (at least it is in parts of
> Tokyo). Tact sucks. See? I see that zakennayo works in Osaka just fine ;)

Shouldn't that be 'tact blows'!

I thought 'sucks' is short for 'sucks the hind teat', as in a runt
being forced to the least desirable (least milk) nipple.

Anyway, use of colloquialism or slang in an international forum just
sticks in my craw and is as useless as balls on heifer.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Skip Tavakkolian wrote:

> Anyway, use of colloquialism or slang in an international forum just
> sticks in my craw and is as useless as balls on heifer.

Then don't do it, don't get involved in such discussions. But it
demonstrates a certain lack of respect to dis other people who seem
comfortable with it. As to utility, I don't think your individual opinion
should be forced on others. Do you? How would you like -me- making such
decisions about -you-?

The idea -isn't- to lower the bar to some commen level. Just jump higher
if you feel the need. Otherwise, move to a different event.

The -really- funny thing about his sort of stuff is the people doing the
complaining are -the- ones turning it into a flame fest.

Da svidanya menya droog.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Dan Cross]

> > Anyway, use of colloquialism or slang in an international forum just
> > sticks in my craw and is as useless as balls on heifer.
>
> Then don't do it, don't get involved in such discussions. But it
> demonstrates a certain lack of respect to dis other people who seem
> comfortable with it. As to utility, I don't think your individual opinion
> should be forced on others. Do you? How would you like -me- making such
> decisions about -you-?
>
> The idea -isn't- to lower the bar to some commen level. Just jump higher
> if you feel the need. Otherwise, move to a different event.
>
> The -really- funny thing about his sort of stuff is the people doing the
> complaining are -the- ones turning it into a flame fest.

Uhh, ``sticks in my craw'' and ``useless as balls on a heifer'' are
both colloquialisms.  I think Skip was making a joke.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Boyd Roberts]

Dan Cross wrote:

>I think Skip was making a joke.
>
Really?  How _can_ you say _that_?

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Dan Cross]

> Really?  How _can_ you say _that_?

In the same I way I can say that Choate was mixing his cases in Russian.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Roman V. Shaposhnick]

On Thu, Oct 31, 2002 at 07:58:38AM -0600, Jim Choate wrote:
>
> Da svidanya menya droog.

  hm. what's the name of this language? But anyway, it's not the one you
  intended it to be.

Roman.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[okamoto]

>Tact sucks.
>
>-rob

I must say I can't follow your native speaker's English anymore.   ;_;
Please, if possible, remember there is a foreigner who's native language
is not English...

Sorry making noise.

Kenji

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 okamoto@granite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp wrote:

> >Tact sucks.
> >
> >-rob
>
> I must say I can't follow your native speaker's English anymore.   ;_;
> Please, if possible, remember there is a foreigner who's native language
> is not English...
>
> Sorry making noise.

Zakennayo, fera tact.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[rob pike, esq.]

Tact sucks.

-rob

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, rob pike, esq. wrote:

> Tact sucks.

Always been my view as well, pity most folks never mature to that level.
Instead they spend their life chasing form instead of function. Pity that.

I saw Noam Chomsky a couple of weekends ago and I can't describe the joy
at hearing him use the word 'nigger' in the same sense that I've been
using it for nearly 10 years. The reaction of seeing a bunch of 20/30
somethings was well worth all the hassles over the years. Maybe they grew
a little that Sunday afternoon.

it may be unpopular but it is on the mark, and -that- is what counts.

Lucent management sucks!


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Russ Cox]

> So much for tact.

>    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
>    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com

hmm.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Russ Cox wrote:

> > So much for tact.
>
> >    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
> >    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
>
> hmm.

Hmmm indeed, pity you don't understand it or you wouldn't have responded.

You should spend some time and learn about Anais Nin.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Skip Tavakkolian]

You're not kidding.  For every distributed-fs (to use the term
loosely) like WebDAV that is publicized, there are many variations
that are in products that get used everyday.  There is no mentoring
and most developers out there either have the patience or given the
time to study the state of technology.  The ready-shoot-aim school of
development is the norm.  Organizations like Bell Labs are the exception.

The situation is not hopeless.  Much as I like to believe otherwise, I
have been convinced that most people don't like to think for
themselves and would like others to do it for them (herd mentality).
So all it takes is a "killer app", a success story to push concepts
like Plan9's into the mainstream.  Then you'll have a new crop of
programmers having their own misconceptions, building new misguided
derivatives.  That's life.

> An infinite number.  Every year or two someone figures out that,
> hey, we can use fad-of-moment to write a remote file system protocol,
> without thinking that a) it's only fad-of-moment, not inherently
> valuable and that b) knowing nothing about how to write a file
> system protocol should stop me from barging ahead willy-nilly.
>
> as you might sense, this is a hot button for me, right next to
> the 'hey, i can write a cool naming hack to make fad-of-moment
> work with this system'.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Geoff Collyer]

> the way yet another thing gets hacked in on top of another hack and
> so on ...

I thought FTP was an overly-complex botch of a protocol, but when I
was told what WebDAV was (HTTP as [lousy] remote file system
protocol), I felt sick to my stomach.  Apple claim that they developed
this abomination, but they could have just used IMAP, which clearly
already is a [rotten] remote file system protocol but doesn't know it.
HTTP was a hack to transport the much worse hack of HTML and now
they're piling kludges on top of hacks.  (Is there really any point to
using XML?  Maybe I'm missing the obvious, but I don't see that it
buys one anything.)

How many awful, truncated remote file system protocols are people
going to invent before they just bite the bullet and use a real one?

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[rob pike]

> How many awful, truncated remote file system protocols are people
> going to invent before they just bite the bullet and use a real one?

An infinite number.  Every year or two someone figures out that,
hey, we can use fad-of-moment to write a remote file system protocol,
without thinking that a) it's only fad-of-moment, not inherently
valuable and that b) knowing nothing about how to write a file
system protocol should stop me from barging ahead willy-nilly.

as you might sense, this is a hot button for me, right next to
the 'hey, i can write a cool naming hack to make fad-of-moment
work with this system'.

-rob

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Lucio De Re]

On Wed, Oct 30, 2002 at 08:17:42AM -0500, rob pike wrote:
>
> An infinite number.  Every year or two someone figures out that,
> hey, we can use fad-of-moment to write a remote file system protocol,
> without thinking that a) it's only fad-of-moment, not inherently
> valuable and that b) knowing nothing about how to write a file
> system protocol should stop me from barging ahead willy-nilly.
>
The sad thing is, some of these catch on like wild fire and prove just
how fashion-driven the marketplace is.  So your hot button is perfectly
justified.

++L

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Lucio De Re wrote:

> On Wed, Oct 30, 2002 at 08:17:42AM -0500, rob pike wrote:

> > An infinite number.  Every year or two someone figures out that,
> > hey, we can use fad-of-moment to write a remote file system protocol,
> > without thinking that a) it's only fad-of-moment, not inherently
> > valuable and that b) knowing nothing about how to write a file
> > system protocol should stop me from barging ahead willy-nilly.
> >
> The sad thing is, some of these catch on like wild fire and prove just
> how fashion-driven the marketplace is.  So your hot button is perfectly
> justified.

No, it's not. So much for tact.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Ronald G Minnich]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Geoff Collyer wrote:

> How many awful, truncated remote file system protocols are people
> going to invent before they just bite the bullet and use a real one?

you are so optimistic. What makes you think they will *ever* use a real
one :-)

ron

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[John E. Barham]

Geoff Collyer wrote:

> > the way yet another thing gets hacked in on top of another hack and
> > so on ...
>
> I thought FTP was an overly-complex botch of a protocol, but when I
> was told what WebDAV was (HTTP as [lousy] remote file system
> protocol), I felt sick to my stomach.  Apple claim that they developed
> this abomination, but they could have just used IMAP, which clearly
> already is a [rotten] remote file system protocol but doesn't know it.

Give WebDAV some credit...  It does have several nice benefits over FTP:
easier custom authentication (assuming you're using something like Apache),
encryption via SSL, HTTP caching.  Being able to attach artitrary properties
to WebDAV resources also opens up some interesting possibilities:  for
example, I'm writing a unified POP3/IMAP/Webmail system that uses WebDAV as
the mail repository which means I can pre-parse the message headers and
store them as properties, somewhat reminiscent of how the Plan 9 mail file
server works.  It also makes remote, cross-platform development of the
servers trivial and I can browse the mail repository in my web browser.

> HTTP was a hack to transport the much worse hack of HTML and now
> they're piling kludges on top of hacks.

So the web is a hack.  Maybe several hundred million people can be wrong,
;), but it's easier (technically and politically) to make Plan 9 interop w/
what's out there in wide use than vice versa.

> (Is there really any point to
> using XML?  Maybe I'm missing the obvious, but I don't see that it
> buys one anything.)

It does seem gratuitous to use XML for WebDAV properties.

> How many awful, truncated remote file system protocols are people
> going to invent before they just bite the bullet and use a real one?

How many journaling file-systems does Linux really need?  People will insist
on re-inventing wheels (maybe badly) but for whatever reasons some of them
do pick up momentum and I might as well go along for the ride.

    John

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Dan Cross]

> [...]  People will insist
> on re-inventing wheels (maybe badly) but for whatever reasons some of them
> do pick up momentum and I might as well go along for the ride.

Okay.  Well, have fun.  I think I'll stay at home because I'm pretty
tired of taking rides in cars with square wheels.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[C H Forsyth]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 153 bytes --]

i wasn't commenting particularly about any particular functionality
but the way yet another thing gets hacked in on top of another hack
and so on ...

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 3822 bytes --]

[-- Attachment #2.1.1: Type: text/plain, Size: 395 bytes --]

I think differentlly, sorry Charles.

Why people use computers these days?
Word processing, some sort of professional works, and WEB BROWSING.
I suppose, if I could have such power, I'll try to research what the problem
of web browsing these days, and what is should be in future.  Then, how
we can incorporate it into our world, and how we can organize people to
this world...

Kenji

[-- Attachment #2.1.2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 1717 bytes --]

From: Charles Forsyth <forsyth@caldo.demon.co.uk>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 2002 08:31:12 0000
Message-ID: <6935bb240e5f862de23c27d1dc81d4f2@caldo.demon.co.uk>

i sometimes wonder how much more of this sort of thing
we're going to have to suffer.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[okamoto]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 395 bytes --]

I think differentlly, sorry Charles.

Why people use computers these days?
Word processing, some sort of professional works, and WEB BROWSING.
I suppose, if I could have such power, I'll try to research what the problem
of web browsing these days, and what is should be in future.  Then, how
we can incorporate it into our world, and how we can organize people to
this world...

Kenji

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 1717 bytes --]

From: Charles Forsyth <forsyth@caldo.demon.co.uk>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 2002 08:31:12 0000
Message-ID: <6935bb240e5f862de23c27d1dc81d4f2@caldo.demon.co.uk>

i sometimes wonder how much more of this sort of thing
we're going to have to suffer.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Charles Forsyth]

i sometimes wonder how much more of this sort of thing
we're going to have to suffer.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[rob pike]

> i sometimes wonder how much more of this sort of thing
> we're going to have to suffer.

a lot. we'll also have to suffer a lot of lousy URL-like
naming systems grafted onto working, regular naming systems
such as those of Plan 9 and Unix.

-rob

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Charles Forsyth wrote:

> i sometimes wonder how much more of this sort of thing
> we're going to have to suffer.

So much for tact...


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Russ Cox]

The hard part about ftpfs is parsing the directory listings
and caching the results so that things like ls work reasonably.

I can't figure out exactly what WebDAV means, but my
first impression is that something like webfs might do
nicely, assuming the set of valid names is reasonable.
The arbitrary structure of the XML properties might get
in the way.

In any case, I think webfs is probably good to read
just to get used to what's going on in a typical file
server.  Of all the ones I've written, I think webfs is
particularly clean.  nntpfs is pretty clean too, and
quite a bit smaller.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Boyd Roberts]

Russ Cox wrote:

>The hard part about ftpfs is parsing the directory listings
>and caching the results so that things like ls work reasonably.
>
Well, yes and no.  The RFC says you should not* parse the machine dependent
[LIST] output and you should use the results of NLST.  The trouble is
that the
latter doesn't actually tell you very much.  Anyway a lot of the detail
is useless,
but knowing the size is useful.

When I did ftpfs with NFS I decided to use NLST, forge the link count
[who cares?],
cd into everything  (giving file/directory info), forge the mode and set
the size to 0.  As
stuff got read/written, sizes were 'learnt'.  Modes were learnt too as a
result of getting
read/write permission errors.  If was a fools errand anyway, but it did
demonstrate [again]
that NFS was a lousy protocol.


* It actually says '... may be hard to use automatically in a program'.
  I guess I read that as 'I'll be buggered if I'll code up any more system
  dependent string smashing in C -- dealing with NFS and XDR has
  been bad enough'.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Skip Tavakkolian]

WebDAV tries to provide a filesystem abstraction with a URI based
namespace and uses HTTP for transport. The description of the data (file
attributes and payload) is in XML. Atomic unit of data is a file (PUT, GET, etc.)
In a superficial way it is like 9P, but not in details or what it's going after.

If you just want the client side (mentioned in another email), then as
Russ suggests, you should have a short way to go from webfs.  You'd
have to figure out the mapping between PUT/GET/POST/MKCOL/LOCK/etc
and 9P calls.

> There seems to be a fair bit of overlap in the goals and functionality of
> WebDAV and 9P so I was wondering how feasible it would be (I'm a reasonably
> competent C programmer) to attempt writing a WebDAV file system for Plan 9
> (i.e., essentially a WebDAV equivalent to ftpfs).  I thought it would be an
> interesting project to teach me Plan 9 programming.
>
> I'm assuming that given HTTP is a stateless protocol that it would be
> simpler than ftpfs.  Could much be re-used from webfs?

[9fans] WebDAV file system

[John E. Barham]

There seems to be a fair bit of overlap in the goals and functionality of
WebDAV and 9P so I was wondering how feasible it would be (I'm a reasonably
competent C programmer) to attempt writing a WebDAV file system for Plan 9
(i.e., essentially a WebDAV equivalent to ftpfs).  I thought it would be an
interesting project to teach me Plan 9 programming.

I'm assuming that given HTTP is a stateless protocol that it would be
simpler than ftpfs.  Could much be re-used from webfs?

    John

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Tue, 29 Oct 2002, John E. Barham wrote:

> I'm assuming that given HTTP is a stateless protocol that it would be
> simpler than ftpfs.

The statelessness of HTTP under 9P is not a given since you don't need a
httpd to serve the pages, 9P does that. This means that it is completely
possible to write a state-sensitive browser. The -only- time you need
anything even remotely looking like a httpd under 9P is if you need the
page you want to 'render' to execute one or more programs in a seperate
and secure process namespace that only returns the results (ie server
side equivalent). The advantage to 9P is that it is the client who ends up
paying for that process resource, not the provider.

9P is cool, at least to me, because it does away with the need for the
'server' in a lot of client-server situations. This will eventaully have a
major impact in the way systems are built I suspect. I suspect it will
cause one or more nervous breakdowns as well.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

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Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[John E. Barham]

Jim Choate wrote:

> > I'm assuming that given HTTP is a stateless protocol that it would be
> > simpler than ftpfs.
>
> The statelessness of HTTP under 9P is not a given since you don't need a
> httpd to serve the pages, 9P does that. This means that it is completely
> possible to write a state-sensitive browser. ...

Hmmm.  I guess I wasn't making myself clear.  I want to write a native Plan
9 file system that exposes a remote WebDAV server in much the same way that
ftpfs makes a remote ftp server appear to be part of the local fs.  By
"stateless" I meant that HTTP creates a new TCP connection for each page
(modulo pipelining) whereas ftp requires that the socket be held for as long
as the connection lasts.  I don't see how even a (hypothetical) Plan 9
browser could make HTTP stateful since even if you have fs access to
cookies, they're typically just handles to server-side session state which
should be opaque.

Anyway, I just thought that a WebDAV fs would be comparatively simple since
it would "only" have to implement enough client-side HTTP to be able to map
the WebDAV commands to the equivalent 9P commands.

Re: [9fans] WebDAV file system

[Jim Choate]

On Tue, 29 Oct 2002, John E. Barham wrote:

> Hmmm.  I guess I wasn't making myself clear.

Seemed perfectly clear to me. I was simply making a point about HTTPD
and client-server under 9P and how different it was to 'standard' OS'es.

> I want to write a native Plan 9 file system that exposes a remote WebDAV
>  server in much the same way that ftpfs makes a remote ftp server appear
>  to be part of the local fs.

Rage on. You should spend less time talking ;)

> By "stateless" I meant that HTTP creates a new TCP connection...

> I don't see how even a (hypothetical) Plan 9 browser could make HTTP
> stateful since even if you have fs access to cookies,

Who needs cookies under 9P? Nobody, that's who. There is nearly -zero-
requirement for a conventional httpd under 9P, therefore there is nearly
-zero- need for cookies. Cookies are a convention to let the -server- know
where the user has been. If there is no server per se who is going to read
those cookies? Nobody. The users client can track all that locally, it
only processes html and executes cgi scripts. The trick is the cgi, there
are two 'modes' that it can be executed in. The first is conventional
cleint side scripts. Pretty easy to impliment, the users browser simply
spawns off a process with the apropriate namespace and waits for the
results to return from the process cloud. When they do, it renders the
page for the user (again via the process cloud since it doesn't need to be
done on the users i/o processor). The other approach has to do with server
side programs. These require that the user can execute them and grab their
i/o stream, but has zero control over reading, writing, or namespace. So,
9P requires that the user be able to see the name of the program and spawn
a 'process namespace' off that the user has zero control over (and I
admit I'm a little fuzzy on exactly how to do that, right now).

Note that all of this doesn't require a cookie, only that the users
browser have a pretty conventional 'history' function. This means that 9P
is -very- cost effective from the 'server' perspective. Create it, mount
it somewhere persistent, and forget about it.

Personaly I find the twist that 9P makes to the usual client-server
approach to be truly elegent.


 --
    ____________________________________________________________________

    We don't see things as they are,                      ravage@ssz.com
    we see them as we are.                                   www.ssz.com
                                                  jchoate@open-forge.org
    Anais Nin                                         www.open-forge.org

    --------------------------------------------------------------------