# Re: URLs, URIs, and references

Marc Andreessen (marca@ncsa.uiuc.edu)
Tue, 25 May 93 18:22:33 -0500

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    Date: Tue, 25 May 93 18:22:33 -0500

    From: marca@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Marc Andreessen)

    Message-Id: <9305252322.AA00963@wintermute.ncsa.uiuc.edu>

    To: Peter Deutsch <peterd@bunyip.com>

    Subject: Re: URLs, URIs, and references

    In-Reply-To: <9305252056.AA05203@expresso.bunyip.com>

Peter Deutsch writes:
> Part of the problems we're experiencing may have resulted from a
> dose of feeping creaturism, and part because not enough people have
> actually gone out and done some coding, while waiting for something
> to gel. Both should be fairly easy to fix. We just have to have some
> people do the equivalent of that Nike and "Just Do It".

You must be referring to non-WWW efforts only?

> 1) With which of the following statements do you most
> agree (pick one and only one):
>
> - "URLs are for machines"
>
> - "URLs are for people"

URL's are for machines, assuming URN's or URC's or something "for
people" are in place -- yesterday. We've got a team of developers
looking forward to helping make that happen.

Otherwise, URL's are for people.

This still seems to me to be the fundamental paradox. URL's are
currently playing a role I don't think they should have to play simply
because the "for people" mechanisms aren't yet in place.

> 2) For each set of statements below, rank them in order of
> preference. (with a clear understanding that if we give
> you your first choice this may make it difficult or
> impossible to give you your last choice):

Under the assumption that "for people" URN's/URC's exist, here goes
nothing...

> - "URLs are to be easily manipulated by machine"
> - "URLs must be easily extensible to new systems"
> - "URLs are to be easily transcribable without error (by machines)"
> - "URLs should be issued only by a specific server."
> - "URLs are to be easily transmitted through existing
> infrastucture, (eg. email)"
> - "URLs should be derivable from first principles
> by anyone who needs them."
> - "URLs are to be easily readible by humans"
> - "URLs are to be easily transcribable without error (by humans)"
> - "URLs must fit within the confines of a single bar
> napkin, at no less that 7 point type."
> - "It should be possible, starting with a URL, to
> identify the appropriate URN and associated meta-information."
> - URLs should provide hints to the system about
> when they may or may not have gone out of date."

I dunno about this one:

> - "URLs should provide strong typing information."

In the context of WWW, I'd been thinking that links would need to be
typed, at the very least. So, moving up from there, typing should be
provided somewhere in the URC/URN/URL hierarchy. This is probably (?)
a separate issue.

Of course, I reserve the right to flip-flop on any of this tomorrow,
when someone talks me into something different...

Cheers,
Marc

    --
    Marc Andreessen
    Software Development Group
    National Center for Supercomputing Applications
    marca@ncsa.uiuc.edu

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