[JDEV] Feature negotiation/File transfers, was Krufty Jabber Client

[Vivre Draco]

On 9 Aug 99,, arh14 at cornell.edu sounded off on RE: [JDEV] Krufty Jabber Client:

> My (obviously incorrect) assumption was that Jabber clients would
> all implement a uniform interface and have the same services
> available.  

   If you've tried many email programs, you know that this is far 
from the case there. Think of Jabber the same way.

> For non-streaming media is it not feasible to build rudimentary
> file transport into the Jabber protocol?  Otherwise, as a client,
> I would have to download and install every single transport to 
> make sure I could recieve every type of message. 

   Well, I think some protocols beyond Jabber protocol should be 
built into most clients, but they aren't (and shouldn't be) a 
requirement before you can use Jabber. For example, we should agree 
on a way to negotiate a file transfer connection, and may want to 
recommend a standard file transfer protocol to be used. A client 
should only try to activate other programs for protocols it doesn't 
directly support, and it should have the basic, standard protocols 
like FTP (or whatever becomes the "recommended" Jabber file transfer 
protocol) built into it. And if it doesn't, it can either try to 
activate another program to do it, or it can tell the other client 
that it doesn't support that protocol.

--
"It is well to remember that the entire population of the universe, 
 with one trifling exception, is composed of others." 
--John Andrew Holmes 

Copyright 1999 Vivre Draco (cfc at paganpaths.org)
excelsior ad infinitum -- http://www.paganpaths.org/~cfc/