From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2000 09:27:29 +0000 From: Lyndon Nerenberg Message-ID: <86vgy33uej.fsf@gollum.esys.ca> References: , <200007181831.TAA12571@whitecrow.demon.co.uk> Subject: Re: [9fans] mothra Topicbox-Message-UUID: e48ca1b2-eac8-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 >>>>> "Steve" == Steve Kilbane writes: Steve> The protocols should be separate. Whether it's something as Steve> simple as writing a URL to a ctl file and reading a page Steve> back from a data file, or something more subtle, I don't Steve> know, but the posting and fetching shouldn't have much of a Steve> clue about what to do with the result. Exactly. An httpfs that just serves HTTP raw MIME content (and handles caching). We have to divorce HTTP from HTML. They're two distinct problems. We should look at the 3rd edition mail system for clues on how to layer an HTML reader on top of an HTTP fileserver. The mail problem is very similar: MIME on top of IMAP. s/IMAP/HTTP/ using the existing MUA tools and we're much of the way there. (Especially if httpfs can export a file/directory structure comparable to how the IMAP server does it. httpfs caching might in fact be mandatory for this to be possible.) --lyndon