On 1/18/2005 6:32 PM Ben Kennedy noted that:
Not that I know much about RSS, but isn't it a simple paramaterless HTTP request that serves up a whole pile of XML?
In a POP transaction, there is a simple login process, and then no data is transferred if there is nothing new. My [admittedly thin] understanding is that you get the whole XML file whether or not much of its contents are relevant. Is that not true?
In the typical dumb implementation that you see most everywhere nowadays, yes. It doesn't have to be as heavyweight as you will typically find it today - just most designers have been lazy on this point thus far...
Someone else was explaining offline that the difference in mechanism is rather small, but the difference in *source* is significant. Most people get their mail from a relatively local server whereas NNTP and RSS are more remote and centralized.
-- Regards,
-rwr
"In the modern world the intelligence of public opinion is the one indispensable condition for social progress."
- Charles W. Eliot (1834 - 1926)
