Hi Benjamin,
thanks a lot for your extensive review. Please fidn my comments inline.
Il 09/09/2020 20:47, Benjamin Kaduk via Datatracker ha scritto:
Benjamin Kaduk has entered the following ballot position for
draft-ietf-regext-rdap-partial-response-13: Discuss
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DISCUSS:
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As was the case for Murray, I'm unconvinced that I have understood what
Section 3 intended to convey. However, I am balloting Discuss because
my current best understanding is for a statement that seems inconsistent
with my understanding of how the partial response mechanism works. In
particular, how would the topmost objects be returned according to
different field sets, if there's only a single query parameter and (I
assume) all topmost objects are the results of the same single query?
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COMMENT:
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Thanks to the shepherd for noting that the examples have been through
JSONLint!
Abstract
The Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) does not include
capabilities to request partial responses. Servers will only return
full responses that include all of the information that a client is
authorized to receive. A partial response capability that limits the
[There is perhaps some stylistic question of whether to describe the
present state in the present tense vs. saying something like "prior to
the mechanism defined in this document" or "as specified in [RFC7483".]
Section 1
Currently, RDAP does not provide a client with any way to request a
partial response. Servers can only provide the client with a full
nit: will this age well?
[ML] :-)
Section 2
The path segment defined in this section is an OPTIONAL extension of
search path segments defined in [RFC7482]. This document defines an
It's not entirely clear to me in what sense it's accurate to say that
this section "defines" a path segment. (Perhaps RDAP path segments
diverge from normal HTTP and generic URI path segments in this sense?)
My current understanding is that we are defining an optional query
parameter in the purest URI sense, which does not require a new path
segment in the URI sense.
full response (Figure 1). The field sets supported by a server are
usually described in out-of-band documents (e.g. RDAP profile)
nit: comma (and only one space) after "e.g.".
[ML] There is only one space after "e.g." in the XML version. Anyway,
I'll put the comma.
Section 2.1
responses about the available field sets. Such information is
collected in a new data structure named "subsetting_metadata"
containing the following properties:
I assume this is a JSON datastructure, specifically?
[ML] OK. I'll specify "JSON data structure"
o "availableFieldSets": "AvailableFieldSet[]" (OPTIONAL) an array of
objects, with each element describing an available field set.
Members are:
* "name": "String" (REQUIRED) the field set name;
* "default": "Boolean" (REQUIRED) whether the field set is
applied by default;
Is it allowed to have more than one entry in the array set
"default":true?
[ML] Obviously not. Should I furtherly explain that only one field set
must be applied by default? Isn't implicitly stated by the meaning of
"applied by default"?
* "links": "Link[]" (OPTIONAL) an array of links as described in
[RFC8288] containing the query string that applies the field
set.
I suggest giving an example or a bit more detail as to exactly what
structure/format is expected here; 8288 has a fair bit of meat to it.
Ah, but this is covered in Section 2.1.2, so maybe just a
forward-reference is enough.
[ML] I'll put the reference "(see Section 2.1.2)"
It would be good (either here or there) to
give some indication as to which of "value"/"rel"/"href"/"title"/"type"
are required/optional, though.
[ML] In Section 4.2 of RFC7483bis
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-regext-rfc7483bis/> is written:
The "value", "rel" and "href" JSON values MUST be specified. All other
JSON values are OPTIONAL.
Could be enough to report the same text?
Section 4
o "id": the server provides only the key field: "handle" for
entities, "ldhName" for domains and nameservers. If a returned
domain or nameserver is an Internationalized Domain Name (IDN)
[RFC5890], then the "unicodeName" field MUST be included in the
nit: I suggest "also" or "additionally be included".
[ML] OK. I'll change it to "MUST additionally be included"
The "objectClassName" field is implicitly included in each of the
above field sets. RDAP providers SHOULD include a "self" link in
each field set. RDAP providers MAY also add any property providing
service information.
Just to check my understanding: the "property" that might also be added
here is a "field" that would be included in a given field set and
corresponding query response? (I don't know if "property" has
RDAP-specific connotations that make it a better word to use here.)
[ML] it is a required property as defined in Section 4.9 of RFC7483bis
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-regext-rfc7483bis/>
(nit?) I'm also not entirely sure that 'include a "self" link in each
field set' is pedantically correct, as opposed to 'include a "links"
field indicating the "self" link relationship'.
[ML] OK.
Section 8
I suppose it's always possible that by using a narrow field set a client
would not get back some important piece of information, e.g., a modifier
that restricts the scope of applicability of some information. It seems
fairly obvious that the onus for knowing what fields are possible and
avoiding this scenario falls on the client, though perhaps it is worth
also giving some guidance to the server to take this into consideration
while defining field sets.
[ML] I'm convinced that the number and the content of the field sets
defined in an RDAP profile should be agreed between producers and
consumers. I expect that the field sets number and content will be the
result of a tuning process.
Servers can also define different result limits according to the
available field sets, so a more flexible truncation strategy can be
I'm not entirely sure I am understanding this correctly -- is it just
saying (roughly) "when using the 'id' field set it's safe to use much
larger page size than for the 'full' field set"? (I didn't find a
specific definition of "result limits" in RFCs 7482 or 7483.)
[ML] Yes, exactly. The value "result set truncated due to excessive
load" is presented among the values defined in Section 10.2.1 of RFC7483
for "Notice and remark Types". When a server returns such notice, it
means that server limits have been exceeded.
implemented. The new query parameter presented in this document
provides RDAP operators with a way to implement a server that reduces
inefficiency risks.
Perhaps it's worth mentioning that in the face of unupdated clients
these potential gains are not actually realized.
[ML] Could you furtherly explain this concept?
Section 9.1
The one place we cite RFC 7481 does not seem to itself be a normative
usage (though I can imagine that one does need to read it in order to
build a complete system).
[ML] Do you suggest to insert it among the "informative References"? I
think that even if it isn't essential to implement the proposed
capability, I believe it's needful to achieve a comprehensive
implementation that takes into account the relationship between the
availability and the content of each fiedl set and the user access profiles.
For this reason, I put it among the "Normative References"
Appendix A
Looking at the implementation experiences of partial response, two
approaches are observed:
Looking at context from later in the suggestion suggests that this
survey was not restricted to RDAP partial response, which might be worth
mentioning.
[ML] OK. Could be enough to update the sentence as in the following?
"Looking at the implementation experiences of partial response offered
by data providers on the web, two approaches are observed"
o The request of some fields might not match the client's access and
authorization levels. Clients might request unauthorized fields
and servers should define a strategy for responding, such as
always returning an error response or returning a response that
nit: I think this is more of "servers have to" than "servers should"
(even though this strategy might just be "do whatever the existing code
happens to do").
[ML] OK. I change that sentence as you suggest.
Appendix A.1
o Relevant entity object information is included in a jCard, but
such information cannot be easily selected because it is split
into the items of a jagged array;
nit: I didn't find "jagged array" used in either RFC 7483 or RFC 7095;
is is relationship to jCard specified somewhere else?
[ML] It is not a jCard specific term. It is a term generally used in the
programming languages to refer to an array of arrays of which the member
arrays can be of different sizes. The straightforward deserialization of
a jCard produces a jagged array.
The latter approach seems to facilitate RDAP interoperability.
Servers can define basic field sets which, if known to clients, can
increase the probability of obtaining a valid response. The usage of
nit: the "latter approach" seems to be an artifact of some text moves,
as there isn't a recent comparison of two approaches in this section.
("Latter approach" also appears in the following paragraph.)
[ML] I'll replace "latter approach" with "the field sets approach".
Hope I forgot nothing.
Looking forward for your reply to my comments and proposed updates.
Best,
Mario
--
Dr. Mario Loffredo
Systems and Technological Development Unit
Institute of Informatics and Telematics (IIT)
National Research Council (CNR)
via G. Moruzzi 1, I-56124 PISA, Italy
Phone: +39.0503153497
Mobile: +39.3462122240
Web: http://www.iit.cnr.it/mario.loffredo
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