The evolution of web protocols

This paper outlines the evolution of World Wide Web protocols. The paper reviews the original protocols developed for the Web, in addressing, transport and data formats. A review of developments of the protocols is given, including developments of web data formats (HTML 4.0, cascading stylesheets and XML), transport (HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/NG) and addressing (URLs). The paper describes how the web initially lacked a metadata architecture and outlines the emergence of a metadata architecture for the web. The paper includes a review of Web technologies which have a social impact on our society, including the Web Accessibility Initiative, the Digital Signature Initiative and the Platform for Privacy Preferences Project. Background to Web Protocols The World Wide Web (often referred to as WWW or the Web) has been defined as “the universe of network-accessible information, the embodiment of human knowledge” [1]. The web is based on a set of protocols and conventions which initially covered the data format of resources, addressing of resources, the transport of resources across the Internet: Formats: The native format for resources on the Web is HTML, the Hypertext Markup Language. Transport: The HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) provides the mechanism by which Web browsers and other user agents access resources. Addressing: Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) provide an address for resources on the Web. The development of these protocols is given below. The Evolution of Web Protocols 1