Mailing Lists: Apple Mailing Lists
Image of Mac OS face in stamp
 
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: Safari and printer configuration pages

Marc,

Thanks for the response! It brings up a more general problem that I'm struggling with as I try to incorporate zeroconf into our products. I'm trying to find the right service types for things.

We have a database that I'm writing server discovery for. Let's call the protocol for that server, _database.

Here are the products...

 1 - The database
 2 - An ftp server that actually has the database as the back-end.
 3 - A web-server that is actually a client for our database. The interface is provided as a web-page.
 4 - A local database that is a proxy (and local cache) to a real database across the world

Here's what I have so far.

1 - _database._tcp
2 - _ftp._tcp,_database
3 - _http._tcp,_database
4 - _database._tcp,_database or... _database._tcp with TXT record "proxy" ?

How does that setup look to you?

The first is obvious, and the second makes sense because it is an ftp server. The FTP server is a facade that covers the database. The third is a little weird because it's a little more vague what _http is going to get you. Still, _http (in the zeroconf sense) seems to mean "human-readable web page" (or else it becomes a different protocol name like _DAAP) so it must mean "Human-Readable Web Page about the database"

The last seems the trickiest. It speaks the _database and the back end speaks the *same* protocol. It's just not obvious what service it offers. Is it a cache? A filter? Does it transform the data in any way? At any rate, a TXT record seems a better choice for number 4, given the ambiguity.

    TXT records seem to be good at "tagging" services (in the same way that
    iPhoto "tags" photos) and subtypes seem to be good at indicating that a
    service, while speaking a primary protocol, is actually part of a larger
    protocol system. Does Apple have a recommendation about subtypes?

At any rate, if Safari has some way of grouping subtypes in the future (like printers), I'd sure like our database to be grouped as well. :)

_ michael

PS. How would Apple do such a thing in Safari anyway? I've looked in the list archive and subtypes don't seem to be discoverable (unless they are duplicated with some kind of TXT record ie. subtypes="subtype1,subtype2"). While it works, it seems like it would be cleaner for Apple to provide in the API, some way of discovering the subtypes procedurally.


On Mar 25, 2007, at 12:59 PM, Marc Krochmal wrote:

Hi Michael,

On Mar 25, 2007, at 12:39 PM, Michael Bishop wrote:

Apple,

Is there anyway for Safari to separate out the printer configuration pages from the rest of the web pages it discovers through Bonjour? At my company we have 12 printers and they all show up side-by-side with the rest of the web pages we've made discoverable.

It makes a great demo to see all of them, but I rarely use those pages and would want to be able to see them visually separated from the other pages.

I've thought on my own about how this could be implemented and came up with a few ways.

1 - Safari could browse for _printer services as well as _http services and find matches.

2 - _printer could be a required subtype of _http services in the Bonjour Printing spec.

Any thoughts?

I agree that it would be useful for Safari to browse for printers and then group them together, and I also agree with your suggestions for browsing using _printer service as well as _printer subtype of HTTP.

Best Regards,

-Marc


 _______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
Bonjour-dev mailing list      (email@hidden)
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/bonjour-dev/email@hidden

This email sent to email@hidden
References: 
 >Safari and printer configuration pages (From: Michael Bishop <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Safari and printer configuration pages (From: Marc Krochmal <email@hidden>)



Visit the Apple Store online or at retail locations.
1-800-MY-APPLE

Contact Apple | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2007 Apple Inc. All rights reserved.