Re: LYNX-DEV when relative URLs should ignore BASE

[Foteos Macrides]

Al Gilman <address@hidden> wrote:
>As I get it, the point is that intra-page references should be
>satisfied from within the current docment, regardless of what has
>been established as a BASE.
>
>An isolated #fragment is, by Roy's logic not a "relative URL" but
>a null url, which can be made its own case in the resolution
>scheme.

        Correct.

        The formal statement of that, in Section 3 of the almost final
draft (Content-Base is being eliminated from HTTP/1.1 and MHTML, and
all references to it also will be eliminated from the URL -> URI
specs), is:

      URI-reference = [ absoluteURI | relativeURI ] [ "#" fragment ]

with this "plain words explantion":

   When a URI reference is used to perform a retrieval action on the
   identified resource, the optional fragment identifier, separated from
   the URI by a crosshatch ("#") character, consists of additional
   reference information to be interpreted by the user agent after the
   retrieval action has been successfully completed.  As such, it is not
   part of a URI, but is often used in conjunction with a URI.  The
   format and interpretation of fragment identifiers is dependent on the
   media type of the retrieval result.

The fragments for the text/html "media type" presently have two possible
"interpretations".  One is "Go find the MAP for this client-side image
map to interpret how clicks in various positions of the image should
be handled." (Lynx can't inline images, and has its own, different but
homologous interpretation. :)  The other is for positioning within the
document.  The draft encompasses both, but the change in how to default
for an empty "[ absoluteURI | relativeURI ]" is geared toward the
latter.

        The main problem with the change, for backward compatibility,
is when the empty URI field is a FORM's ACTION.  After much discussion,
mostly off-line between me and Roy, he agreed that it should be treated
as an exception and still default to the base, rather than "(current
document)", when they are different:

   However, if the URI reference occurs in a context that is always
   intended to result in a new request, as in the case of HTML's FORM
   element, then an empty URI reference represents the base URI of the
   current document and should be replaced by that URI when transformed
   into a request.

                                Fote

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