World Wide Web's inventor apologises for http:// - Polidicks

[quote=BBC News][b]The forward slashes at the beginning of internet addresses have long annoyed net users and now the man behind them has apologised for using them.[/b] Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of the World Wide Web, has confessed that the // in a web address were actually "unnecessary". He told the Times newspaper that he could easily have designed URLs not to have the forward slashes. "There you go, it seemed like a good idea at the time," he said. He admitted that when he devised the web, almost 30 years ago, he had no idea that the forward slashes in every web address would cause "so much hassle". His light-hearted apology even had a green angle as he accepted that having to add // to every address had wasted time, printing and paper. Sir Tim is currently director of the World Wide Web Consortium and he is also working with the UK government to help open up access to government data. [/quote] [url]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8306631.stm[/url] www. is more annoying because it's completely unnecessary but everyone thinks you have to type it.

I prefer [url]http://youtube.com[/url] over http:youtube.com It's a lot clearer.

[QUOTE=PieClock;17827625]I prefer [url]http://youtube.com[/url] over http:youtube.com It's a lot clearer.[/QUOTE] I agree.

[QUOTE=PieClock;17827625]I prefer [url]http://youtube.com[/url] over http:youtube.com It's a lot clearer.[/QUOTE] I prefer: youtube.com It's a lot Clearer[B]er[/B]

[QUOTE=Stopper;17827643]I prefer: youtube.com It's a lot Clearer[B]er[/B][/QUOTE] But the http: bit is necessary, just not the //, if you read the article. Anyway, on firefox you can just type youtube.com and it works, I do it all the time.

//'s great. Looks good, and confuses the cattle.

[QUOTE=Stopper;17827643]I prefer: youtube.com It's a lot Clearer[B]er[/B][/QUOTE] I prefer: youtube It's the clearer[b]er[i]ist[/i][/b] because my browser just auto directs me to it.

I don't even see why http:// is necessary, or even www. Just go to facepunch.com and it will resolve it perfectly, the web should have this built in as standard (without browsers needing to help it along), special cases like ftp: should have to be defined still, but if http: isn't defined it defaults to it. confusing post with maybe some wrong bits (I think it might be the DNS not the browser), but you get the picture who cares anyway just use bookmarks

[QUOTE=DementNeo;17827687]I don't even see why http:// is necessary, or even www. Just go to facepunch.com and it will resolve it perfectly, the web should have this built in as standard (without browsers needing to help it along), special cases like ftp: should have to be defined still, but if http: isn't defined it defaults to it. confusing post with maybe some wrong bits (I think it might be the DNS not the browser), but you get the picture who cares anyway just use bookmarks[/QUOTE] Because if it isn't there it would try to look on your local computer for a file.etc I think.

:lol: Who would have guessed? V:v:V

[QUOTE=DementNeo;17827687]Just go to facepunch.com and it will resolve it perfectly[/QUOTE] Yes, because your browser will automatically add http:// in front of it. You have to at least tell what protocol you're using. // is not necessary, and neither is www. But you need http:

He won't be sorry until someone hunts him down and plays baseball with his kneecaps! But seriously, I haven't even used the "http://" part often since primary school (6 years ago)

I take it the inventor of UNIX is also apologizing for using the forward-slash mark to seperate the orginizational folders in an operating system?

He's acting like it's a huge deal. I've never heard anyone being bothered by // and it's certainly never bothered me.

[QUOTE=madjawa;17827879]Yes, because your browser will automatically add http:// in front of it. You have to at least tell what protocol you're using. // is not necessary, and neither is www. But you need http:[/QUOTE] You don't need any of them with firefox actually.

I forgive him.

If I want to enter a URL in OmniWeb I still have to enter [url]http://.[/url] Thanks a lot Tim.

http:// is a protocol, just like steam:// and many other stuff... I don't get it why it is "so much hassle" because in most of the web browsers you don't have to type http:// [QUOTE=pentium;17828045]If I want to enter a URL in OmniWeb I still have to enter [url]http://.[/url] Thanks a lot Tim.[/QUOTE] not really his fault more the fault of Omniweb.

[QUOTE=PieClock;17827656]But the http: bit is necessary, just not the //, if you read the article. Anyway, on firefox you can just type youtube.com and it works, I do it all the time.[/QUOTE] You can do this on [i]any[/i] web browser.

[QUOTE=DementNeo;17827687]I don't even see why http:// is necessary, or even www. Just go to facepunch.com and it will resolve it perfectly, the web should have this built in as standard (without browsers needing to help it along), special cases like ftp: should have to be defined still, but if http: isn't defined it defaults to it. confusing post with maybe some wrong bits (I think it might be the DNS not the browser), but you get the picture who cares anyway just use bookmarks[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=PieClock;17827821]Because if it isn't there it would try to look on your local computer for a file.etc I think.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Jack Bryce;17827909]He won't be sorry until someone hunts him down and plays baseball with his kneecaps! But seriously, I haven't even used the "http://" part often since primary school (6 years ago)[/QUOTE] The only reason you don't need any of these is because the browser is smart enough to add them for you, they are essential for the internals of the www to work correctly. Just because some clever client side code means us dumb users don't need to worry about them doesn't mean they aren't an incredibly important part of the system.

Maybe I'm just used to it but I actually like it better with the slashes in now.

[QUOTE=Sams Brume;17827664]I prefer: youtube It's the clearer[b]er[i]ist[/i][/b] because my browser just auto directs me to it.[/QUOTE] I see your "youtube" and raise you a "yt". Huzzah. Clearer[b]er[i]ist[/i][/b][highlight]er[/highlight] than yours!

we don't even have to type http:// www. anymore and in some cases not even the domain.

Type in wherever you want to go, without "http://www." or ".com", hold Ctrl and hit Enter. It auto adds everything else.

Lets calculate what he has done... There are 1,668,870,408 internet users currently. Lets just assume that averaged, everybody types http:// for once per day. From the average typer, typing http:// takes maybe 1.5 seconds. By multiplying the amount of internet users with 1.5 seconds, and then converting it to years, we get about 79.38 years. So due to his stupidity, it would take 79.38 years from one person every day just to type that unnecessary letter-combination

[QUOTE=SGTNAPALM;17828079]You can do this on [i]any[/i] web browser.[/QUOTE] I don't give a shit about [i]any[/i] other browser. Firefox is superior to me.

Protocols aren't useless. They're good to access content that was designed for a specific protocol, like steam for connecting to a server, or file for viewing files on the local hard disk, and FTP for accessing an file directory on a remote server, and SVN.

Yeah but the point was he could have just signalled a protocol just by http: - the slashes were not necessary, although I don't mind them.

[QUOTE=AMD 32;17833777]Yeah but the point was he could have just signalled a protocol just by http: - the slashes were not necessary, although I don't mind them.[/QUOTE] i was directing that post toward the posts above stating it was useless.

The // has never annoyed me. Why would you even type in [url]http://?[/url] Just type in [url]www.sitehere.com[/url] and it works. [editline]06:02PM[/editline] Huh. That's a real website...