4 ms·

> [HTTP is] a mind-bendingly terrible protocol in its own right Could you detail your thoughts on this? The more I work with HTTP, the more I get impressed wit

by bodhi 15y ago

> [HTTP is] a mind-bendingly terrible protocol in its own right Could you detail your thoughts on this? The more I work with HTTP, the more I get impressed with how usable it is. Granted, it's not suited for some domains...

emperorpenguin 15y ago
Ok, I'm being somewhat unfair. HTTP is an adequate (although overly-complex) protocol for simple document retrieval. It is unfortunate, (in my opinion), that we've used it in a whole ton of ways for which it was never intended. Have you considered some of the hacks that we have to use to make HTTP do what we want? Comet/longpoll? JSONP? Have you looked at the bajillion different ways in which browsers and proxies fail to implement caching in a consistent manner? How browsers will only allow a limited number of concurrent connections to a particular host? Have you looked at a x-www-form-urlencoded post? Do you think that's a good way to send data around? Anyway, I'm not really after a big discussion of HTTP's merits - my apologies for excessive opinionation. I am, however, interested in why so many people think REST is a magic bullet.
- DougWebb 15y ago
  Clearly HTTP has been a complete failure...
  - emperorpenguin 15y ago
    Don't confuse ubiquity with quality. Witness: VHS, Paris Hilton.
- bodhi 15y ago
  > Have you considered some of the hacks that we have to use to make HTTP do what we want? Right, but this sounds like blaming a nail for permanently attaching something when velcro would have been more suitable. Granted, we haven't had many other options, but to me the surprising thing is that HTTP is flexible enough that all of these hacks can be done. > I am, however, interested in why so many people think REST is a magic bullet. Human nature? ;)
  - emperorpenguin 15y ago
    > Right, but this sounds like blaming a nail Well, more accurately, I'm blaming people who think that nails are awesome and the only way to do things - and in fact we should structure all our applications by making use of a relatively obscure aspect of how nails work :)

by bodhi 15y ago

emperorpenguin 15y ago

Ok, I'm being somewhat unfair. HTTP is an adequate (although overly-complex) protocol for simple document retrieval. It is unfortunate, (in my opinion), that we've used it in a whole ton of ways for which it was never intended. Have you considered some of the hacks that we have to use to make HTTP do what we want? Comet/longpoll? JSONP? Have you looked at the bajillion different ways in which browsers and proxies fail to implement caching in a consistent manner? How browsers will only allow a limited number of concurrent connections to a particular host? Have you looked at a x-www-form-urlencoded post? Do you think that's a good way to send data around? Anyway, I'm not really after a big discussion of HTTP's merits - my apologies for excessive opinionation. I am, however, interested in why so many people think REST is a magic bullet.

DougWebb 15y ago
Clearly HTTP has been a complete failure...
- emperorpenguin 15y ago
  Don't confuse ubiquity with quality. Witness: VHS, Paris Hilton.
bodhi 15y ago
> Have you considered some of the hacks that we have to use to make HTTP do what we want? Right, but this sounds like blaming a nail for permanently attaching something when velcro would have been more suitable. Granted, we haven't had many other options, but to me the surprising thing is that HTTP is flexible enough that all of these hacks can be done. > I am, however, interested in why so many people think REST is a magic bullet. Human nature? ;)
- emperorpenguin 15y ago
  > Right, but this sounds like blaming a nail Well, more accurately, I'm blaming people who think that nails are awesome and the only way to do things - and in fact we should structure all our applications by making use of a relatively obscure aspect of how nails work :)