Subject: RE: [SPIRITS] Half-Pint

From: "Michael O'Doherty" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2001 14:27:01 +0100

Hi,

The Half-Pint internet draft is now properly formatted (more or less) and
available at:

http://search.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-odoherty-half-pint-00.txt

The idea behind the protocol is to try to provide something relatively
lightweight which will still provide a useful set of services for a
developer tying together web and PSTN services. The approach is to trade off
flexibility and completeness for simplicity - hence the name (which is not
cast in stone).

My feeling is that this protocol, while not having the same ultimate
flexibility is simpler to get up and running today than a Pint/Spirits like
approach, especially from the perspective of a web developer. Part of the
thinking is that it is relatively well bounded and part of it is that it
avoids using SIP as a transport as SIP is not quite mature enough or
deployed enough today for the task - I'd be very interested to hear comments
on this view - is there anyone who feels that it would be better to use SIP
as the transport, maybe extending Pint ?

The main aim is to get something working quickly (say within four months as
a goal) that provides the type of functionality contained in the half-pint
draft and allows service developers to start their work, and that has some
sort of consensus behind it from a standards point of view. 

If anybody has views on this approach or on better ways to achieve the same
goal, I'd be very happy to work with you to try to meet these objectives.

Cheers,

Mick.