[OAI-implementers] Re: [oai-alpha] Re: Help!

[ePrints Support]

(from oai-alpha)

On Fri, Jan 26, 2001 at 06:26:33PM -0700, Simeon Warner wrote:
> I agree that the following can be illegal in fairly obvious
> ways:
>   from & until     (illegal dates)
>   identifier       (illegal uri)
>   resumptionToken  (spec says illegal use and expired will give 400)
> 
> However, according to the schemas of verbs that return values that
> will be used for set and metadataPrefix, they also be illegal: 
>   set              (doesn't match "([a-zA-Z0-9_])+(:[A-Za-z0-9]+)*")
>   metadataPrefix   (doesn't match "[a-zA-Z0-9_]+")

from & until: Illegal dates (I agree)

identifier: what's an illegal uri? 
   a) one which dosn't match oai:[a-z]+:.*    (regexp may be slightly off)
or 
   b) one which dosn't match oai:nameofarchive:.*
I suggest (a) - it's possible that an archive could mirror OAI records
from another archive AS WELL as it's own. (Isn't it?)

resumptionToken: If an archive dosn't support this
   then I suppose it should always give a 400 error.
Isn't there an 'expired' return code in http? it's confusing giving
the same response for 'illegal' and 'expired'

set: not matching [a-zA-Z0-9_])+(:[A-Za-z0-9]+)* is a 400 error but
   how about a set which passes the spec but isn't in the archive?
I suggest it just returns a header with no results in that case.

metadataPrefix: similar. Not matching [a-zA-Z0-9_]+ is illegal (400)
   but what happens if it passes the regexp but isn't in the list
   supported the archive?
Again, I suggest it just returns a header with no results in this case.

Other queries:
   oai_dc: When should we put a 'oai_' before the metadataPrefix,
   exactly what does it mean (why isn't it just dc?)

   inside <metadata></metadata> is ANYTHING defined by OAI or
   is everything, including the initial tags <dc></dc> and namespace
   etc. defined by the metadata standard?

-- 

Christopher Gutteridge 
ePrints Technical Support
support@eprints.org