Preface;
Running Example: Joe's Hardware Store;
Chapter-by-Chapter Guide;
Typographic Conventions;
Comments and Questions;
Acknowledgments;
Part I: HTTP: The Web's Foundation;
Chapter 1: Overview of HTTP;
1.1 HTTP: The Internet's Multimedia Courier;
1.2 Web Clients and Servers;
1.3 Resources;
1.4 Transactions;
1.5 Messages;
1.6 Connections;
1.7 Protocol Versions;
1.8 Architectural Components of the Web;
1.9 The End of the Beginning;
1.10 For More Information;
Chapter 2: URLs and Resources;
2.1 Navigating the Internet's Resources;
2.2 URL Syntax;
2.3 URL Shortcuts;
2.4 Shady Characters;
2.5 A Sea of Schemes;
2.6 The Future;
2.7 For More Information;
Chapter 3: HTTP Messages;
3.1 The Flow of Messages;
3.2 The Parts of a Message;
3.3 Methods;
3.4 Status Codes;
3.5 Headers;
3.6 For More Information;
Chapter 4: Connection Management;
4.1 TCP Connections;
4.2 TCP Performance Considerations;
4.3 HTTP Connection Handling;
4.4 Parallel Connections;
4.5 Persistent Connections;
4.6 Pipelined Connections;
4.7 The Mysteries of Connection Close;
4.8 For More Information;
Part II: HTTP Architecture;
Chapter 5: Web Servers;
5.1 Web Servers Come in All Shapes and Sizes;
5.2 A Minimal Perl Web Server;
5.3 What Real Web Servers Do;
5.4 Step 1: Accepting Client Connections;
5.5 Step 2: Receiving Request Messages;
5.6 Step 3: Processing Requests;
5.7 Step 4: Mapping and Accessing Resources;
5.8 Step 5: Building Responses;
5.9 Step 6: Sending Responses;
5.10 Step 7: Logging;
5.11 For More Information;
Chapter 6: Proxies;
6.1 Web Intermediaries;
6.2 Why Use Proxies?;
6.3 Where Do Proxies Go?;
6.4 Client Proxy Settings;
6.5 Tricky Things About Proxy Requests;
6.6 Tracing Messages;
6.7 Proxy Authentication;
6.8 Proxy Interoperation;
6.9 For More Information;
Chapter 7: Caching;
7.1 Redundant Data Transfers;
7.2 Bandwidth Bottlenecks;
7.3 Flash Crowds;
7.4 Distance Delays;
7.5 Hits and Misses;
7.6 Cache Topologies;
7.7 Cache Processing Steps;
7.8 Keeping Copies Fresh;
7.9 Controlling Cachability;
7.10 Setting Cache Controls;
7.11 Detailed Algorithms;
7.12 Caches and Advertising;
7.13 For More Information;
Chapter 8: Integration Points: Gateways, Tunnels, and Relays;
8.1 Gateways;
8.2 Protocol Gateways;
8.3 Resource Gateways;
8.4 Application Interfaces and Web Services;
8.5 Tunnels;
8.6 Relays;
8.7 For More Information;
Chapter 9: Web Robots;
9.1 Crawlers and Crawling;
9.2 Robotic HTTP;
9.3 Misbehaving Robots;
9.4 Excluding Robots;
9.5 Robot Etiquette;
9.6 Search Engines;
9.7 For More Information;
Chapter 10: HTTP-NG;
10.1 HTTP's Growing Pains;
10.2 HTTP-NG Activity;
10.3 Modularize and Enhance;
10.4 Distributed Objects;
10.5 Layer 1: Messaging;
10.6 Layer 2: Remote Invocation;
10.7 Layer 3: Web Application;
10.8 WebMUX;
10.9 Binary Wire Protocol;
10.10 Current Status;
10.11 For More Information;
Part III: Identification, Authorization, and Security;
Chapter 11: Client Identification and Cookies;
11.1 The Personal Touch;
11.2 HTTP Headers;
11.3 Client IP Address;
11.4 User Login;
11.5 Fat URLs;
11.6 Cookies;
11.7 For More Information;
Chapter 12: Basic Authentication;
12.1 Authentication;
12.2 Basic Authentication;
12.3 The Security Flaws of Basic Authentication;
12.4 For More Information;
Chapter 13: Digest Authentication;
13.1 The Improvements of Digest Authentication;
13.2 Digest Calculations;
13.3 Quality of Protection Enhancements;
13.4 Practical Considerations;
13.5 Security Considerations;
13.6 For More Information;
Chapter 14: Secure HTTP;
14.1 Making HTTP Safe;
14.2 Digital Cryptography;
14.3 Symmetric-Key Cryptography;
14.4 Public-Key Cryptography;
14.5 Digital Signatures;
14.6 Digital Certificates;
14.7 HTTPS: The Details;
14.8 A Real HTTPS Client;
14.9 Tunneling Secure Traffic Through Proxies;
14.10 For More Information;
Part IV: Entities, Encodings, and Internationalization;
Chapter 15: Entities and Encodings;
15.1 Messages Are Crates, Entities Are Cargo;
15.2 Content-Length: The Entity's Size;
15.3 Entity Digests;
15.4 Media Type and Charset;
15.5 Content Encoding;
15.6 Transfer Encoding and Chunked Encoding;
15.7 Time-Varying Instances;
15.8 Validators and Freshness;
15.9 Range Requests;
15.10 Delta Encoding;
15.11 For More Information;
Chapter 16: Internationalization;
16.1 HTTP Support for International Content;
16.2 Character Sets and HTTP;
16.3 Multilingual Character Encoding Primer;
16.4 Language Tags and HTTP;
16.5 Internationalized URIs;
16.6 Other Considerations;
16.7 For More Information;
Chapter 17: Content Negotiation and Transcoding;
17.1 Content-Negotiation Techniques;
17.2 Client-Driven Negotiation;
17.3 Server-Driven Negotiation;
17.4 Transparent Negotiation;
17.5 Transcoding;
17.6 Next Steps;
17.7 For More Information;
Part V: Content Publishing and Distribution;
Chapter 18: Web Hosting;
18.1 Hosting Services;
18.2 Virtual Hosting;
18.3 Making Web Sites Reliable;
18.4 Making Web Sites Fast;
18.5 For More Information;
Chapter 19: Publishing Systems;
19.1 FrontPage Server Extensions for Publishing Support;
19.2 WebDAV and Collaborative Authoring;
19.3 For More Information;
Chapter 20: Redirection and Load Balancing;
20.1 Why Redirect?;
20.2 Where to Redirect;
20.3 Overview of Redirection Protocols;
20.4 General Redirection Methods;
20.5 Proxy Redirection Methods;
20.6 Cache Redirection Methods;
20.7 Internet Cache Protocol;
20.8 Cache Array Routing Protocol;
20.9 Hyper Text Caching Protocol;
20.10 For More Information;
Chapter 21: Logging and Usage Tracking;
21.1 What to Log?;
21.2 Log Formats;
21.3 Hit Metering;
21.4 A Word on Privacy;
21.5 For More Information;
Part VI: Appendixes;
Appendix A: URI Schemes;
Appendix B: HTTP Status Codes;
B.1 Status Code Classifications;
B.2 Status Codes;
Appendix C: HTTP Header Reference;
Appendix D: MIME Types;
D.1 Background;
D.2 MIME Type Structure;
D.3 MIME Type IANA Registration;
D.4 MIME Type Tables;
Appendix E: Base-64 Encoding;
E.1 Base-64 Encoding Makes Binary Data Safe;
E.2 Eight Bits to Six Bits;
E.3 Base-64 Padding;
E.4 Perl Implementation;
E.5 For More Information;
Appendix F: Digest Authentication;
F.1 Digest WWW-Authenticate Directives;
F.2 Digest Authorization Directives;
F.3 Digest Authentication-Info Directives;
F.4 Reference Code;
Appendix G: Language Tags;
G.1 First Subtag Rules;
G.2 Second Subtag Rules;
G.3 IANA-Registered Language Tags;
G.4 ISO 639 Language Codes;
G.5 ISO 3166 Country Codes;
G.6 Language Administrative Organizations;
Appendix H: MIME Charset Registry;
H.1 MIME Charset Registry;
H.2 Preferred MIME Names;
H.3 Registered Charsets;
Colophon;