


From: Miles Sabin <msabin@cromwellmedia.co.uk>
Date: Fri, 8 Sep 2000 10:08:28 +0100
Message-ID: <57C6E3244632D411A2F100508BC8079A1312C5@juno.interxtechnology.com>
To: xml-uri@w3.org
John Cowan wrote,
> Miles Sabin wrote:
> > But why should the URI-to-resouce binding be any more 
> > constant than the resource-to-entity body relationship?
> What is the reason for flexibility?

I'm not entirely sure I understand the question. The entity/
resource distinction is sort of useful because it allows for 
the very same resource to persist across changes of its 
constituent bits. But those very same bits can simultaneously 
constitute lots of different resources (a transient page of 
HTML; a persistent but changing page of HTML; todays weather 
report, whatever), so at the very least a URI can be ambiguous
and shift it's reference between those resources depending on
the context.

But then the entity/resouce distinction is also misleading,
because it suggests that we've just got two layers: a changing
bit layer, and a static resource layer. That just doesn't
strike me as particularly plausible. In much the same way as
a changing bunch of bits can constitute an HTML page, a 
changing HTML page can constitute todays weather report. I'm
happy(ish) to retain the term 'entity' to pick out the bottom
of the stack, but I can't see any particular reason why the 
stack shouldn't go on up indefinitely.



Miles Sabin                       Cromwell Media
Internet Systems Architect        5/6 Glenthorne Mews
msabin@cromwellmedia.com          http://www.cromwellmedia.com/
Received on Friday, 8 September 2000 05:10:03 GMT
