# Re: FTP URL mapping

Keith Moore (moore@cs.utk.edu)
Fri, 04 Mar 1994 00:19:25 -0500

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    Message-Id: <199403040519.AAA25808@wilma.cs.utk.edu>

    From: Keith Moore <moore@cs.utk.edu>

    To: Larry Masinter <masinter@parc.xerox.com>

    Subject: Re: FTP URL mapping

    In-Reply-To: Your message of "Thu, 03 Mar 1994 18:19:50 PST."

                 <94Mar3.181958pst.2732@golden.parc.xerox.com>

    Date: Fri, 04 Mar 1994 00:19:25 -0500

> In an attempt to get some movement on this topic, I thought I would
> pursue a concrete proposal, that extends what I thought Keith Moore's
> proposed a while ago. Interpret:
>
> ftp://host.edu/a/b/c/d/e
>
> as
>
> ftp host.edu
> cwd a
> cwd b
> cwd c
> cwd d
> type binary
> retr e

I'd prefer that the "default" interpretation (i.e. without escaping
'/' characters) be:

ftp host.edu
cwd a/b/c/d
type binary
retr e

> if error (no such file), then:
>
> nlist e
>

In the interest of efficiency, I'd like to have a flag in there that
says that a file is a directory. Obviously you can do the NLST
trick as a fallback if an attempt to RETR the file fails.
Maybe an unescaped ? character in the filename portion, optionally
followed by the argument to NLST...since a directory listing is similar
to a search query.

> This solves the problem of the ambiguity of /, but doesn't solve the
> problem of how to determine whether you need `type text' vs `type
> binary'. I propose the simple expedient of including "(text)" after
> URLs that must be retrieved as text:
>
> ftp://host.edu/a/b/c/d/e(text)

Hmmm. isn't there somewhere else the ascii/binary flag can go?

Keith

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