# Re: URLs -- the ftp case

Fred Swartz (fred.swartz@umich.edu)
Fri, 29 Oct 1993 11:43:19 -0400

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    Message-Id: <9310291543.AA01002@merit.edu>

    To: timbl@nxoc01.cern.ch, mpm@boombox.micro.umn.edu

    From: "Fred Swartz" <fred.swartz@umich.edu>

    Subject: Re: URLs -- the ftp case

    In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 29 Oct 1993 13:59:26 BST."

                 <9310291259.AA02218@www3.cern.ch>

    Date: Fri, 29 Oct 1993 11:43:19 -0400

My previous message about changing the FTP URL must have given
the wrong impression: I hate the FTP protocol and love the HTTP
protocol (and sometimes like the Gopher protocol). And I think the
URL proposal is good -- I'm just suggesting that we make a
change to FTP URLs to make them more useful and reflect the
current practice.

> From: Tim Berners-Lee <timbl@www3.cern.ch>
...
>
> The problem then is that you can't browse an FTP directory.
> An FTP directory returns you a list of file names, from
> which you can currently generate URLs. It does't return
> file types. And most FTP URLS are in fact generated by
> FTP server directory listings, not cut out of mail
> messages.

Just because you can't _always_ automatically generate them is
no reason to leave out the necessary transfer mode. In fact
they can be automatically generated in many cases.

> This is because the FTP model is basically broken.
> It is not a consistent and complete data model.
> Onw is that you have to use out-of-band telepathy to
> know what sort of a file it is. The other is that the

Broken indeed. I like that "out-of-band telepathy"!

> The URLs were designed to model the way the protocols
> are *actually used*. We are not reinventing or fixing
> FTP, we are just providing hooks into it for

In fact, FTP transfers ALWAYS take place in some mode.
The is the way they are *actually used*.

> Perhaps we shouldn't cry too much over FTP.

But I cry because of it sometimes.

> Maybe we would need 4 flags:
>
> - text file
> - binary file
> - directory
> - dunno yet but see what you can do (cuurent state)
>
>
> This is not a suggestion.

It's an excellent non-suggestion. So good that I'd like to
make it a suggestion.

Just because FTP is archaic, broken, and just plain evil is
no reason to prevent FTP URLs from being useful. Especially
when the fix seems to be so simple.

-- Fred (fred.swartz@merit.edu)

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