Subject: COPY onto itself (was: Circular Bindings)

From: "Geoffrey M. Clemm" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 12 Sep 1999 00:37:30 -0400

Judy: Would you add this topic to the "action item" list for the
adv. col. spec?  Thanks!

   From: [email-masked]

   <jlc/>
   ... this also reminds me that with AdvColl, it is possible that a
   portion of the source tree and the destination might be common.  And
   that initial deletion phase of the COPY might actually essentially
   delete a portion of the source tree.

   <gmc/> I'd suggest some words to the effect that a COPY should
   be semantically equivalent to a COPY to a temporary URL (that identifies
   a null resource) followed by a MOVE from the temporary URL to the
   destination URL.

   <jcl/> ... I think we need to define what
   COPY/MOVE do across machines that don't cooperate on bindings.  Your
   definition of COPY seems to work across machines as long as we say the
   COPY phase copies to a temporary location on the *destination*
   machine.  MOVE across machines is another matter.  We should say if we
   allow MOVE if the intended semantics can't be achieved.  Or if best
   effort is acceptable.  Or if the client can specify if best-effort is
   acceptable.

<gmc/> Since COPY produces a new set of resources (which won't
be locked or have existing bindings to them), I don't think any
of the cross-server problems should apply here.

Cheers,
Geoff

---

From: John Stracke <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 1999 12:27:41 -0400

>    a null resource) followed by a MOVE from the temporary URL to the

Recursion alert: MOVE is defined in terms of COPY.

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