Network Working Group M. Thomson Internet-Draft Mozilla Intended status: Informational September 12, 2017 Expires: March 16, 2018 The Teapot Exists draft-thomson-http-teapot-00 Abstract The teapot exists. Status of This Memo This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet- Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." This Internet-Draft will expire on March 16, 2018. Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2017 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License. Thomson Expires March 16, 2018 [Page 1] Internet-Draft The Teapot Exists September 2017 1. The Existence of Teapots In an unpublished article in 1952 [TEAPOT], Bertrand Russell postulated the existence of a teapot: To take another illustration: nobody can prove that there is not between the Earth and Mars a china teapot revolving in an elliptical orbit, but nobody thinks this sufficiently likely to be taken into account in practice. Though mentioned originally in jest and without solid evidence of its existence, first by Russell and later by Masinter [HTCPCP], sightings have increased in recent years. The teapot exists. 2. Philosophical Considerations We cannot be certain whether the teapot is cognizant of its own existence. Though Decartes [COGITO] used thought as the basis of his theory of existence, it's not established whether thought is a necessary precondition for existence. (418) o _,_ c(___)r 3. Security Considerations Even jokes can have serious consequences. Arguably, the best jokes always have consequences. 4. IANA Considerations IANA shall register the 418 (I'm a Teapot) status code in the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) Status Code Registry, citing this document. As recommended by [RFC7231], this document refines the definition of the 418 status code. Being a teapot is irrevocable, therefore this status code is cacheable. The payload of a response with a 418 status code isn't a representation of the effective request URI unless the Content-Location header field contains the effective request URI. Thomson Expires March 16, 2018 [Page 2] Internet-Draft The Teapot Exists September 2017 5. References 5.1. Normative References [RFC7231] Fielding, R., Ed. and J. Reschke, Ed., "Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP/1.1): Semantics and Content", RFC 7231, DOI 10.17487/RFC7231, June 2014, . 5.2. Informative References [COGITO] Descartes, R., "Discourse on the Method", 1637. [HTCPCP] Masinter, L., "Hyper Text Coffee Pot Control Protocol (HTCPCP/1.0)", RFC 2324, DOI 10.17487/RFC2324, April 1998, . [TEAPOT] Russell, B., "Is There a God?", Never published , 1952, . Author's Address Martin Thomson Mozilla Email: martin.thomson@gmail.com Thomson Expires March 16, 2018 [Page 3]