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Netscape Dumps Critical File, Breaks RSS 0.9 Feeds
An anonymous reader writes "In the standard definition of RSS 0.91, there are a couple of lines referring to 'DOCTYPE' and referencing a 'dtd' spec hosted on Netscape's website. According to an article on DeviceForge.com quite a few RSS feeds around the web probably stopped working properly over the past few weeks because Netscape recently stopped hosting the critical rss-0.91.dtd file. Probably someone over at netscape.com simply thought he was cleaning up some insignificant cruft." Some explanation has been offered by a Netscape employee.
"A distributed system is one in which the failure of a computer you didn't even know existed can render your own computer unusable."
If I would create a reader that was dependent on version 0.91 of the distribution, it sure as hell would include the DTD in local storage. It makes no sense to create a reader that can also use, say, version 0.92 since you would not know what had changed (and there is no such thing as inheritence between versions of a DTD afaik). Actually, as other readers noted, it would be terribly stupid to make your web-server or client rely on a third party computer for which you cannot guarantee the uptime.
These URL's are mainly there for their Uniqueness, not so much as for a place of quaranteed storage. Of course, they are also a nice place to look for the actual definition, but after that you would need a local repository. This is the first thing an XML library should support, and the first thing a moderately intelligent programmer should look at. I get *very* annoyed if this kind of basic rules are ignored. And I've even seen them ignored by people pointing to the XML digital signature definitions, where security and reliability should be the first requirements in the design.
Also, what would happen if w3c.org or netscape.com go the way of the Gopher? If they go bust? It's a quickly changing world out there.