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While I agree that it sucks to lose text based protocols, we already have an underlying protocol that is completely binary in nature and requires tools to look
by kyrra 13y ago
While I agree that it sucks to lose text based protocols, we already have an underlying protocol that is completely binary in nature and requires tools to look at it (TCP). Same can be said for IP. We've survived a long time with those technologies and we have some awesome tools for working with them. While it's not as easy as ascii based protocols, it's more space efficient, which I'm fine with.
- gdwatson 13y agoBut one of the beautiful features of TCP is that it has the properties necessary to treat it as a text stream -- you can build text-based protocols on top of it. Since troubleshooting an application-level protocol seldom requires you to delve into the TCP-level, it works very well in practice. The HTTP 2.0 draft not only makes the application-level protocol binary, but it eschews the simpler stream metaphor in favor of replicating a bunch of that TCP-level complexity in the higher layer. There are reasons for all of this, of course -- it's not being proposed on a lark. But it does have a very real complexity cost.
- lstamour 13y agoSo don't support HTTP 2.0 if it doesn't benefit you and your use case. It's that simple. In a world where HTML5 says browsers need to pretend to be Netscape Navigator when asked, you'll never lose HTTP 1.x no matter what happens. Never.