RE: ATOM representation of search result facets

As long as you don't use the application/atom+xml media type to describe it, you should be OK.

http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4287#section-4.2.7.6

In that media type, @length means something different than what I think you are using it for, in which case application/atom+xml no longer applies.

That's the way I see it anyway.

Cheers,
Peter


________________________________
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Rich Cariens
Sent: August 28, 2012 17:36
To: [email protected]
Subject: [rest-discuss] ATOM representation of search result facets



Hello!

I need to start including facet counts in my ATOM search results. I'd prefer to reuse existing ATOM elements and attributes if possible. Might as well jump in with a representative example...

Assume a user is submitting a search for "35mm" and would like Manufacturer facet counts included in the results:

-snip-
GET /search?q=35mm&facet=Manufacturer... HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/atom+xml
...
-snip-

I'm thinking the response could look something like this:

-snip-
<feed xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom">
     <title>Product Search Results - 35mm by Manufacturer</title>
     <updated>2012-08-28T17:27:02Z</updated>
     <author>
       <name>My, Inc</name>
     </author>
     <id>urn:uuid:60a76c80-d399-11d9-b93C-0003939e0af6</id>

     <!-- facet results -->
     <link rel="related" title="Canon" length="134" type="application/atom+xml" href="/search?q=35mm&fq=Manufacturer%3DCanon..." />
     <link rel="related" title="Sony" length="78" type="application/atom+xml" href="/search?q=35mm&fq=Manufacturer%3DSony..." />
     <link rel="related" title="Nikon" length="23" type="application/atom+xml" href="/search?q=35mm&fq..." />
     ...

     <entry>
       ...
-snip-

I'm thinking to overload the "link" elements "length" attribute to hold  the facet count. Is this abuse of the spec or the spirit of REST?

Thanks very much!
Rich