Stephane Bortzmeyer stephane at sources.org
Sun Jan 3 13:14:42 GMT 2021
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On Mon, Dec 28, 2020 at 10:12:30AM +0100, Arav K. <nothien at uber.space> wrote a message of 84 lines which said:
Because we don't want the query string to be used as it is in HTML, i.e.
for arbitrary parameters. Using ?lang=<lang> is setting an arguably
dangerous precedent.
This opinion requires some elaboration. There is no reason to choose pathsrather than queries, both are part of the URL. The difference betweenthe two is purely historical (at a time, ? indicated a dynamic page).
Said otherwise, <gemini://capsule.example/foo/bar> or<gemini://capsule.example/foo?bar> have identical semantics. A Geminiclient can deduce nothing from the fact that one uses a path and theother a query.
Note that Amazon managed to *patent* the idea of using parameters inthe path. US "land of the crazy parents" patent n° 7,287,042<http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7,287,042.PN.&OS=PN/7,287,042&RS=PN/7,287,042>