[e-lang] Re: web services constraints and capabilities workshop

[bry at xdocs.dk]

> 
> Doesn't sound as if they mean "capabilities" in the security sense, but we
> don't need to let that stop us.

well I thought that these parts:

# Specific problem domains: e.g., security, privacy, reliable messaging,
internationalization
# Policy Model and the Web Services Architecture: machine readable constraints
on the allowable actions or states of an agent
# Processing models for constraints and capabilities on requester and provider
agents

could be interpreted as applying to capabilities in the security sense. The
first one just suggests particular problem domains that E has a good answer for
(other than internationalization), the second probably has envisioned an ACL
solution, but is worded in such a way that I think capabilities are reasonable,
the third one is not as clear, in the context of the commonly understood meaning
of web services it means nothing, but in the context of say a distributed poker
game it might mean something. I suppose the reason I think that things are
applicable here is that I find the commonly understood concepts of web services
to be especially wrong headed, whereas E's models as to how these kinds of
distributed tasks and running remote processes, seems very clear-sighted. 


> 
> A position paper about the Web Calculus would be a Good Thing (Tyler?) --
> as would a paper expressing the disadvantages of generalized policy
> frameworks for properties where one-size-fits-all is perfectly sufficient.
> 
> For instance:
> 
> # Various aspects of a Web service may require description. This includes
> its
> # constraints (e.g., 'You must use HTTP Authentication when accessing this
> # service') [...]
> 
> Whether a service requires HTTP Authentication is, by definition,
> determined
> by whether I get an error if I try to access it without HTTP
> Authentication.
> Anything else is nothing more than a hint.
> 

I would like to see more web calculus penetration of the web services market
definitely. So such a paper could not help but be a benefit.