# Re: Unresolved URL issues

Randy Bush (randy@psg.com)
Mon, 7 Mar 1994 17:58:34 -0800 (PST)

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    Message-Id: <m0pdr47-00030TC@rip.psg.com>

    From: randy@psg.com (Randy Bush)

    Subject: Re: Unresolved URL issues

    To: mitra@pandora.sf.ca.us (Mitra)

    Date: Mon, 7 Mar 1994 17:58:34 -0800 (PST)

    In-Reply-To: <CMBAoF.1sE@pandora.sf.ca.us> from "Mitra" at Mar 7, 94 08:38:38 pm

The meeting tasked the writing of an NNTP URL, and the minutes would seem to
support that. I recommend that the NNTP URL be of the form

host-identifier / message-id

as opposed to Mitra's suggestion of

host-identifier / article-number

The reasons are,

997 would imply that the ARTICLE [nnn] form is not useful in isolation,
i.e. a non-interactive session.

3.1.2. ARTICLE (selection by number)

ARTICLE [nnn]

Displays the header, a blank line, then the body (text) of the
current or specified article. The optional parameter nnn is the
numeric id of an article in the current newsgroup and must be chosen
from the range of articles provided when the newsgroup was selected.
If it is omitted, the current article is assumed.

------------

host-name/message-id tells you the location of an NNTP server and what an
NNTP client needs to tell an NNTP server to unequivocally get a specific
article. This is the essence of a URL.

host-name/article-number is sufficiently ephemeral (a day or two!) that
message-id to article-number mapping updates (to keep the URN to URL locator
servers current) will create more net traffic than the actual lookups.

------------

[ re: why do gopher news gateways use article-number ]

Because they are interactive browsers, not go-get-identity one-shots.

randy

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