Re: Toward Closure on HTML

Jay C. Weber (weber@eit.COM)
Tue, 5 Apr 94 10:19:32 PDT


> From: Dave Raggett <dsr@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
>
> What we really need is some work on a MIME multipart/related format
> for transferring form contents, as the current URL based approach is
> running out of steam.

Agreed.

We'd probably want to leave FORM method=GET behavior just the way it
is, and update method=POST.

Support on the server side is easy: CGI scripts accepting POSTs could
just start branching on the content-type, e.g., processing a new type
multipart/www-form. A day's worth of hacking.

On the client side, generating multipart/www-form isn't much work
(factoring out the user interface complexity of supporting image
scribbles, etc.), but backwards-compatibility is a bear. The only
way a server can declare format preferences in advance is through
anchors, really; so the only alternative I see is something like
a FORM method=POSTMP.

Dave, do you want to try this with your browser? We'll support it
on the server side.

Jay