RFC - 2396

Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax

Original:	ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2396.txt
Authors:	T. Berners-Lee [MIT/LCS], R. Fielding [Xerox Corporation], U.C. Irvine [Xerox Corporation], L. Masinter [Xerox Corporation]
Date:	August 1998
Category:	Informational
This specification has been !!! obsoleted !!!

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Obsoleted by:
RFC-3986std66 [STD 66]	Uniform Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax

Updates:
RFC-1808	Relative Uniform Resource Locators (Obsoleted by RFC-3986std66) (Updated by RFC-2396, RFC-2368prop)
RFC-1738	Uniform Resource Locators (URL) (Obsoleted by RFC-4266prop, RFC-4248prop) (Updated by RFC-1808, RFC-2396, RFC-2368prop, RFC-3986std66)

Updated by:
RFC-2732	Format for Literal IPv6 Addresses in URL's (Obsoleted by RFC-3986std66)

Referred by:	135 RFC
Refers to:	14 RFC

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Status

This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

Copyright (C) The Internet Society (1998). All Rights Reserved.

IESG Note

This paper describes a "superset" of operations that can be applied to URI. It consists of both a grammar and a description of basic functionality for URI. To understand what is a valid URI, both the grammar and the associated description have to be studied. Some of the functionality described is not applicable to all URI schemes, and some operations are only possible when certain media types are retrieved using the URI, regardless of the scheme used.

Abstract

A Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) is a compact string of characters for identifying an abstract or physical resource. This document defines the generic syntax of URI, including both absolute and relative forms, and guidelines for their use; it revises and replaces the generic definitions in RFC 1738(-> 4266^prop | 4248^prop) and RFC 1808(-> 3986^std66).

This document defines a grammar that is a superset of all valid URI, such that an implementation can parse the common components of a URI reference without knowing the scheme-specific requirements of every possible identifier type. This document does not define a generative grammar for URI; that task will be performed by the individual specifications of each URI scheme.

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