Three HTTP versions later, forms are still a mess

9 months ago

The author is working on adding an HTTP 1.1 stack to Inko's standard library, including server, client, cookie handling, form parsing, and a request router.
HTTP 1.1 is described as messy and organically grown, with RFCs acting more like reference documents than specifications.
The protocol includes odd choices like hexadecimal chunk sizes in chunked transfers and mandatory spaces in response lines.
Form handling in HTTP is particularly messy, with two 'standard' encodings: application/x-www-form-urlencoded and multipart/form-data.
application/x-www-form-urlencoded lacks clear specifications, leading to inconsistent implementations and encoding issues.
multipart/form-data is based on email formats, uses random boundary separators, and is bloated and difficult to parse efficiently.
There's no good alternative for forms mixing files and non-files, with proposals like JSON for forms or XForms not gaining traction.
The author expresses frustration with the lack of progress in form handling despite newer HTTP versions.

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