On 11/12/06, Stuart Charlton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > > > > --- Steve Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Is there another possibility, namely that message exchange actually > > works so why change? There is a fascination in IT with having the > > theoretically "best" approach rather than just one that is "good > > enough". If the current approach is successful (which it is) then > > what is the justification for change? > > Well, in a sense, message exchange actually does work, since hypermedia > systems are really just a higher abstraction of a message passing > system.
You'll have to explain to me how its a higher abstraction... > > The issue is, and I think you've been calling for this yourself, > elevating the level of discourse into concepts that are actually > aligned to the domain. This is largely a problem of social scope & > governance. Most message exchange models are based around federation > of a sort. Hypermedia is intended to work within an anarchy (i.e. no > central control or explicitly shared goals). Is it? Sure the Web links all over the place but that is very different to saying that Hypermedia was designed to solve no central control or goals, BDI was designed to solve that and hypermedia certainly isn't BDI. The problems are indeed social scope and governance, this means that the solution needs to operate at a MUCH higher level of abstraction than REST or WS-*, neither REST or WS-* offer any real help at that level. > > > So there would be quite a bit of upfront design required to achieve > > this end then? I'm not disagreeing but you might want to have a chat > > with Jan. At the end of this will we have something like > > "app/invoice" as a media type ? > > Potentially, yes, if the goal was to create hypermedia for order > processing.... That is one hell of a lot of MIME types required... > > > > And we would need to extend browsers and/or introduce new kinds of > > user > > > agents to understand these new media types. > > > > I'd say it would be user-agents more than browsers as much of this is > > machine -> machine rahter than machine->human. > > True. > > > > And that's absolutely true. There are many other specifications > > > composed in HTTP via reference. The value in HTTP is in the > > > consistent interface it exposes, but it stands on the shoulders of > > > others, and requires new media types to apply in new areas. > > > > So given that REST is very early in the standards area and has none > > of > > the support that SOAP/WSDL had in 2000, why will it succeed? > > I think it's the dark horse. The web exists, and has succeeded wildly. I have to say that in 5 years you can make a bigger claim about WS-*, the Web kicked off in 1990/91, while SOAP/WS started in 1999. I'd say that SOAP/WS-* was bigger than WWW 6 years into its lifecycle. > The syndication web is rising rapidly and challenging entire > industries (journalism). It may take time, but in the long run, I > think it'd be risky to bet against it. And I'm not betting against the internet (which is the bigger beast) what I'd say is that I'll go along with Bill Joy when he talked about multiple different webs, including the business web. There is no reason that each of these "webs" have to use the same technology approach as the human->human one. The syndication web is just part of the person->person web, hence the reason it _should_ work on the same technology stack. The business web needs to work on the same basis as businesses to today, this means a lack of trust between organisations, a high degree of formalism (driven by lawyers) and the importance of QoS. > > Cheers > Stu > > __________________________________________________________ > Yahoo! Music Unlimited > Access over 1 million songs. > http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited >
