[occi-wg] OCCI MC - State Machine Diagram

[Tim Bray]

On May 14, 2009, at 7:55 AM, Sam Johnston wrote:

>> Meh, it doesn't matter if you push a button, poke it with a stick,  
>> kick it or use the force - the result is the same. If anyone is to  
>> be getting a visit from the REST police I guess it's me but on  
>> reviewing Tim's insightful RESTful Causistry post (and the  
>> comments) I think we're on the right track here... he talks about  
>> GET but I think either would do.
>
> would'nt GET be prone to some kind of spider GETing all links it  
> came across (for indexing) causing data centre havoc ?
>
> Details - not if we don't include authentication information, check  
> user agents, etc. but if we feel it necessary to keep sharp  
> implements out of the way of the children then we can.

Here's the rule (http://www.w3.org/TR/webarch/#safe-interaction):   
"Agents do not incur obligations by retrieving a representation."

That is to say, spiders and pre-fetching proxies and so on are  
perfectly entitled to GET any link they see, and if mayhem ensues,  
it's the server's fault, not the client.  People often say "GET should  
not cause a change in state" which is wrong, because it writes logfile  
entries and sets cookies and all sorts of stuff.

  -Tim