Nobody is implementing the guidelines?
I was disappointed to discover from the public minutes a few days ago, that the W3C BPWG had to give up the quest to establish standards for Content Transformation Proxies. It would seem that they just didn’t get enough implementations to conclude that the specification was ready for prime-time, and it’s now going to be consigned to Note status. After all the work that they put into this effort, this really is an ignominious end. I’m sure the casual observer will be debating the possible causes for this, including perhaps:
- The providers of CT solutions can’t/won’t comply.
- The CT providers have moved on to other things and don’t care about the CTG.
- CT proxies are becoming less relevant as more sites go truly mobile.
Whatever you might think, it’s never a good sign when a lot of hard work grinds to a halt like this.
It is unfortunate that the work didn’t conclude with a proper Recommendation, because badly behaving CT proxies are a real pain. They mess with good mobile content, break things that should work, waste resources, interfere with security and privacy, and much more. It’s a pity the properly behaving solution providers didn’t step up to show how it can be done. Instead we now have the impression that even the better solutions can’t do it right.
Categorised as: Protocols & Specs, Web