[PyWrapper-devel] [tdwg-tapir] RE: WG: tapir: capabilities

[Renato De Giovanni]

Hi John,

Implementing the log request was never a problem. We discussed about 
that again during the Madrid meeting, and only after that a feature 
freeze was suggested. It's true that PyWrapper is being adjusted now 
to conform to the new specs, and considering that DiGIR2 (or wasabi) 
postponed implementation of TAPIR, I suppose it should not be a big 
problem to make additional changes if necessary.

The main problem I had with the log request was that it would 
probably not solve the issue behind it, which is to track usage by 
data aggregators. I still have the same feeling, and I can easily 
imagine situations when it would not be easy or even possible to 
translate searches on top of cached databases to TAPIR requests.

But maybe I'm wrong, and if you all think it's a good feature then we 
can try to include it. However, I do think that providers should be 
able to advertise as the part of capabilities if they want to receive 
log requests or not. 

To me it also sounds like a new operation, especially if it's only 
related to search. It could make sense for view, inventory and 
metadata operations. Maybe capabilities too. But it doesn't make 
sense for ping. Well, maybe it could make sense for ping if the data 
aggregator monitors provider status and accepts similar requests on 
top of its results...

So, yes, it could be a new attribute "logOnly" as part of the 
operationRequestGroup with an answer </received> (just after the 
response header). And we could add an attribute "acceptLogRequests" 
in the <operations> element in capabilities responses. The other 
option would be to include a new operation, but maybe it's better to 
just have it as an optional attribute for all operations.

Best Regards,
--
Renato

On 19 Jul 2006 at 10:32, John R. WIECZOREK wrote:
> 
> I appreciate that you will consider this request. I always thought
> it 
> would be trivial to implement. Your simulation mode sounds very much
> like what I had in mind. I hadn't thought it necessary to get a 
> response from a log request, but if there was a simple response, it
> could be used as a ping, or it could be used to retry logging until
> the provider did respond. So, something like <log request received>.
> I think the addition oflogOnly attribute is a good one, and could 
> apply to every request type. 
> 
> Javi, I don't disagree that portals SHOULD log the data usage, 
> especially to cover the situations where a provider doesn't respond.
> I also think that having the information logged at the provider is a
> responsible course of action, since they will have immediate access
> to the usage statistics that way. It will be much easier for a
> portal 
> builder to send log requests than it will be to build the 
> infrastructure and interfaces to logs, therefore it is more likely
> to 
> actually get done. 
> 
> 
> On 7/18/06, Javier de la Torre <jatorre at mncn.csic.es> wrote: 
>     I am not sure about this,
>     
>     I still think that portals should be gathering this data and
> making
>     it available for data providers... 
>     
>     But in any case if you like it then I agree with MArkus that the
> best
>     is to include another parameter in the operationRequestGroup.
>     
>     I havent checked but what happens if you do an extension there
> with
>     an attribute that is implementation specific? A qualified
> attribute.
>     Will this still validate against our schema? You were
> discussing
>     about qualification of attributes before no?
>     
>     Javi.
>     
>     On 18/07/2006, at 10:41, Döring, Markus wrote: 
>     
>     > John,
>     > all changes going on with TAPIR right now are really only
> changes
>     > in terminology or removing inconsistencies we did not detect
> before
>     > we started the documentation and final implementation. 
>     >
>     >
>     > But nevertheless I would support your request. Especially from
> the
>     > implementation side of view this is a trivial change to the
> code.
>     > So why dont add it? Just some additional thoughts: 
>     >
>     >
>     > - Ive added a "simulation" mode already to my code where no
> SQL
>     > gets executed but just logged. So you can test
> configurations
>     > without risking sending off killer statements. Thats similar
> to 
>     > logOnly I guess, returning nothing but diagnostics. What would
> you
>     > suggest to be returned for a logOnly request? just the empty
> TAPIR
>     > envelope? Nothing? <OK>?
>     >
>     > - would this log-only request not be needed for all requests?
> at 
>     > least for inventories? So it would be easiest to have a new
> logOnly
>     > parameter in the header or "request element" just after the
> header?
>     > something like <search logOnly="true">
>     >
>     >
>     >
>     > -- Markus
>     >
>     >
>     >> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
>     >> Von: pywrapper-devel-bounces at lists.sourceforge.net 
>     >> [mailto:pywrapper-devel-bounces at lists.sourceforge.net] Im
>     >> Auftrag von John R. WIECZOREK
>     >> Gesendet: Montag, 17. Juli 2006 23:30 
>     >> An: Renato De Giovanni
>     >> Cc: pywrapper-devel at lists.sourceforge.net; tdwg-
>     tapir at lists.tdwg.org 
>     >> Betreff: Re: [PyWrapper-devel] [tdwg-tapir] RE: WG: tapir:
>     >> capabilities
>     >>
>     >> A little off topic, but it occurs to me that a great deal
> of
>     >> work is still ongoing with TAPIR, which suggests to me that
>     >> it may be warranted to re-state my request for a simple
>     >> message type - a log request. This request would be the
> same
>     >> as a search request, except that the caller doesn't need a
>     >> response. Providers would use this type of request to log 
>     >> data usage if the data were retrieved from a cache
> elsewhere.
>     >> I remember talking about this in Berlin, at which time
> there
>     >> was supposed to be a feature freeze. Clearly we've gone
>     >> beyond that, so I'm requesting it again. 
>     >>
>     >>
>     >> On 7/17/06, Renato De Giovanni <renato at cria.org.br> wrote:
>     >>
>     >>Hi,
>     >>
>     >>If I remember well, the "view" operation was re-included in 
>     the 
>     >>protocol just to handle query templates, especifically
>     >> for TapirLite
>     >>providers. So if someone wants to query a provider using
> some
>     >>external output model that should be dynamically 
>     >> parsed, then the
>     >>"search" operation must be used instead (using either
>     >> XML or simple
>     >>GET request). View operations are really bound to query
>     >> templates, 
>     >>and they are not allowed to specify "filter" or
>     >> "partial" parameters.
>     >>--
>     >>Renato
>     >>
>     >>On 17 Jul 2006 at 21:26, "Döring, Markus" wrote: 
>     >>
>     >>> I was just about to edit the schema and realizing
>     >> that output models
>     >>> are only specified for searches. but what about
>     >> views? they use
>     >>> query templates, yes. but only the ones listed in 
>     >> capabilities? we
>     >>> should have dynamic ones here as well I think. And
>     >> they link back to
>     >>> static/dynamic models.
>     >>>
>     >>> So should models maybe become a seperate section not tight
>     to 
>     >>> search/view operations? I am going to modify the
>     >> schema nevertheless
>     >>> already to accomodate the changes below - ignoring
>     >> views for now.
>     >>>
>     >>> Markus