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Re: Re: Why REST? (RE: WSIO- With Name)

• To: xml-dev@l...
• Subject: Re: Re: Why REST? (RE: WSIO- With Name)
• From: Paul Prescod <paul@p...>
• Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2002 08:36:04 -0800
• References: <2C61CCE8A870D211A523080009B94E4306FEE84F@HQ5>

"Bullard, Claude L (Len)" wrote:
> 
> ...
> 
> To rephrase:  even if it isn't RESTful, even if it isn't
> "The Web" as some polity defines that rather abstract
> incantation, will UDDI work 'well-enough', because
> if it does, then the usual rubric of "running code
> and rough consensus' is met.  On with the wiring.

Whether or not UDDI uses REST, UDDI will not work because its problems
have nothing to do with how they use networking protocols. REST can no
more help UDDI than it can help the Moonies.

http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2001/10/03/webservices.html

"Even after using XML to create a description in WSDL and registering it
with UDDI, two arbitrary entities still can't achieve automatic
interoperability because there is no guarantee that an entity looking
for a Web Service will be able to specify its needs clearly enough that
its inquiry will match the descriptions in the UDDI database."

"This attempt to define the problem at successively higher layers is
doomed to fail because it's turtles all the way up: there will always be
another layer above whatever can be described, a layer which contains
the ambiguity of two-party communication that can never be entirely
defined away."

"Without AI, the description and discovery of Web Services is going to
require a great deal of good old fashioned human intelligence. And
whenever humans get involved, things get sticky."

I don't claim to have magical solutions to these problems. I keep
plugging away at the same old, painful solution I've been plugging away
at for years: standards. We've got a standard application protocol. In
the context of REST: we've got a standard application protocol. It does
what we need. Reinventing a *less* expressive protocol like SOAP-RPC is
both a step backwards and a waste of time. Inventing domain specific XML
vocabularies like widgetML -- now that's a step forward! Seriously.

If you want a registry for businesses I would suggest you use Google or
Yahoo. If you want to look up businesses by NAICS code, I'd suggest you
ask Google (or Yahoo) to implement that. They knows a lot more about
making useful search engines than web services people do.

 Paul Prescod

• References:
  • RE: Re: Why REST? (RE: WSIO- With Name)
    • From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>

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