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Subject: RE: [kmip] Application Specific Information: 'Application Data' should be optional
Greetings Further to today’s KMIP TC call, and w.r.t. our discussion about the Application Data field [in the Application Specific Information attribute]… I have reviewed the KMIP v1.2 Usage Guide and found no evidence in the Guide to support my claim that an empty (null) string in the Application Data field would serve to indicate the “absence” of that field [and thereby invoke the server’s obligation to generate Application Data corresponding to the given Application Namespace]. It follows that no qualifier is required in my proposed change to Table 99: Application Specific Information. The Application Data field should simply be marked as “not required” [i.e. “No”]: +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | O b j e c t | E n c o d i n g | R E Q U I R E D | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Structure | | | Specific Information | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | Yes | | Namespace | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | No | | Data | | | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ Table 99: Application Specific Information Attribute Unless I misunderstood, I believe this change will find its way into the KMIP 1.4 specification. Regards, … Dave From: Featherstone, David Greetings An inconsistency exists in the KMIP specification’s description of the Application Specific Information attribute. On one hand, the body of the description says that the Application Data element can be omitted. On the other hand, the tabular summary description of this attribute states that the Application Data element is required. 3.36 Application Specific Information The Application Specific Information attribute is a structure (see Table 120) used to store data specific to the application(s) using the Managed Object. It consists of the following fields: an Application Namespace and Application Data specific to that application namespace. Clients MAY request to set (i.e., using any of the operations that result in new Managed Object(s) on the server or adding/modifying the attribute of an existing Managed Object) an instance of this attribute with a particular Application Namespace while omitting Application Data. In that case, if the server supports this namespace (as indicated by the Query operation in Section 4.25), then it SHALL return a suitable Application Data value. If the server does not support this namespace, then an error SHALL be returned. +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | O b j e c t | E n c o d i n g | R E Q U I R E D | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Structure | | | Specific Information | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | Yes | | Namespace | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | Yes | | Data | | | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ Table 99: Application Specific Information Attribute I understand that some implementations interpret “omitted” to mean the null, or empty string, but that is not the general intent of the term [as used elsewhere in specification – e.g. Table 144 Register Attribute Requirements]. The Application Data element should be marked as optional [i.e. REQUIRED=No] in the table, with a qualifier for backwards compatibility: +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | O b j e c t | E n c o d i n g | R E Q U I R E D | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Structure | | | Specific Information | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | Yes | | Namespace | | | +----------------------+---------------------+----------------------+ | Application | Text String | No - may be omitted | | Data | | or null (empty) | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+ Table 99: Application Specific Information Attribute Cheers, … Dave The information contained in this electronic mail transmission may be privileged and confidential, and therefore, protected from disclosure. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by replying to this message and deleting it from your computer without copying or disclosing it. |
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