Gregory Szorc <gregory.szorc@gmail.com> [Tue, 13 Mar 2018 19:44:59 -0700] rev 37050
wireproto: define content negotiation for HTTPv2
HTTP messages communicate their media types and what media types
they can understand via the Content-Type and Accept header,
respectively.
While I don't want the wire protocol to lean too heavily on HTTP
because I'm aiming for the wire protocol to be as transport
agnostic as possible, it is nice to play by the spec if possible.
This commit defines our media negotiation mechanism for version
2 of the HTTP protocol. Essentially, we mandate the use of a
new media type and how clients and servers should react to
various headers or lack thereof.
The name of the media type is a placeholder. We purposefully don't
yet define the format of the new media type because that's a lot
of work.
I feel pretty strongly that we should use Content-Type. I feel
less strongly about Accept. I think it is reasonable for servers
to return the media type that was submitted to them. So we may
strike this header before the protocol is finished...
Differential Revision: https://phab.mercurial-scm.org/D2850
Gregory Szorc <gregory.szorc@gmail.com> [Tue, 13 Mar 2018 14:15:10 -0700] rev 37049
hgweb: also set Content-Type header
Our HTTP/WSGI server may convert the Content-Type HTTP request
header to the CONTENT_TYPE WSGI environment key and not set
HTTP_CONTENT_TYPE. Other WSGI server implementations
do this, so I think the behavior is acceptable.
So assuming this HTTP request header could get "lost" by the WSGI
server, let's restore it on the request object like we do for
Content-Length.
FWIW, the WSGI server may also *invent* a Content-Type value. The
default behavior of Python's RFC 822 message class returns a default
media type if Content-Type isn't defined. This is kind of annoying.
But RFC 7231 section 3.1.1.5 does say the recipient may assume a media
type of application/octet-stream. Python's defaults are for
text/plain (given we're using an RFC 822 parser). But whatever.
Differential Revision: https://phab.mercurial-scm.org/D2849
Gregory Szorc <gregory.szorc@gmail.com> [Tue, 13 Mar 2018 11:57:43 -0700] rev 37048
wireproto: require POST for all HTTPv2 requests
Wire protocol version 1 transfers argument data via request
headers by default. This has historically caused problems because
servers institute limits on the length of individual HTTP headers
as well as the total size of all request headers. Mercurial servers
can advertise the maximum length of an individual header. But
there's no guarantee any intermediate HTTP agents will accept
headers up to that length.
In the existing wire protocol, server operators typically also
key off the HTTP request method to implement authentication.
For example, GET requests translate to read-only requests and
can be allowed. But read-write commands must use POST and require
authentication. This has typically worked because the only wire
protocol commands that use POST modify the repo (e.g. the
"unbundle" command).
There is an experimental feature to enable clients to transmit
argument data via POST request bodies. This is technically a
better and more robust solution. But we can't enable it by default
because of servers assuming POST means write access.
In version 2 of the wire protocol, the permissions of a request
are encoded in the URL. And with it being a new protocol in a new
URL space, we're not constrained by backwards compatibility
requirements.
This commit adopts the technically superior mechanism of using
HTTP request bodies to send argument data by requiring POST for
all commands. Strictly speaking, it may be possible to send
request bodies on GET requests. But my experience is that not all
HTTP stacks support this. POST pretty much always works. Using POST
for read-only operations does sacrifice some RESTful design
purity. But this API cares about practicality, not about being
in Roy T. Fielding's REST ivory tower.
There's a chance we may relax this restriction in the future. But
for now, I want to see how far we can get with a POST only API.
Differential Revision: https://phab.mercurial-scm.org/D2837