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Do you really think the world would be better place right now if email had been distributed as a library and not as a protocol anyone could implement? How could
by quotemstr 12y ago
Do you really think the world would be better place right now if email had been distributed as a library and not as a protocol anyone could implement? How could that possibly have worked? And how could it possibly have solved compatibility problems? It's not as if you can get everyone to upgrade libraries simultaneously.
- zanny 12y agoThe library becomes the de facto protocol. The difference is that there is a mindshare that updating libraries to stay current is less intrusive than having a protocol revision change break backwards compatibility. I don't necessary think it would have been better, or even feasible, just that it is a situational quandary, not just the black and white "protocols always win". Protocols enable interoperability at the cost of rigidity and resistance to change. You should protocolize when you are are damn sure you aren't changing anything else, and there have been very few technologies where you can say the protocols conceived a decade ago are still problem free today.