ServerAlias considered harmful

[Kjetil Kjernsmo <kjetil@kjernsmo.net>]

On mandag 12 september 2005, 02:07, David Clymer wrote:
> but wouldnt it
> be much easier to add a ServerAlias to the vitualhost config?

Without trying to respond to the original question, I would like to 
point out that ServerAliases are eeeevil and architecturally broken. 
The redirect should have been a 301, otherwise it results in URI 
aliasing, which is bad: 

http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/WD-webarch-20040816/#uri-aliases

I asked Dan Connolly (one of the main web architects) about ServerAlias 
once, and he said he could see valid uses for it, but the general use 
as it is now is just architecturally broken.  

To see why, my previous project at work involved finding and counting 
which URIs of what sites is broken in Opera, and that was complicated 
by widespread URI aliasing, it was simply impossible to count that 
reliably. 

Cheers,

Kjetil
-- 
Kjetil Kjernsmo
Programmer / Astrophysicist / Ski-orienteer / Orienteer / Mountaineer
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