Talk:Comet (programming)/Archive 2

message: Any objections to adding more detail about the Bayeux protocol?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by RealWorldExperience (talk • contribs) 21:33, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: What kind of more detail?  It's quite possible I'll object, if the addition seems excessive for this article.  What do you think readers of this page would need to know about Bayeux that they can't currently figure out from a combination of this article and the linked Bayeux spec?  My suggestion would be instead to add an article about Bayeux to Wikipedia, and put detailed information about it there.  But this article could potentially have a bit of detail added.  Depends what you have in mind. —jacobolus (t) 02:10, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

text: I would be interested to hear more, is this a related technology? - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 21:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bayeux 

message: I believe the "Implementations" section should be reduced. We don't need to link to every Comet-like piece of code ever written (see "pi.comet", for instance). 
I should try to establish a neutral criteria for inclusion so that to avoid link spamming. 
What could be a good criteria for inclusion on this list? --Damiens.rf 17:46, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, but have no ideas on criteria, the most basic idea would be to only include those things important enough to have their own wikipedia article. Restepc (talk) 20:34, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

text: I agree with you whole-heartedly.  I have no idea what useful criteria would be, however.  None of these, or nearly none of them, deserve their own wikipedia articles, so by that standard the section should be removed altogether.  On the other hand, I think mentioning implementations is useful for readers.  —jacobolus (t) 23:58, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "''[[Comet_%28programming%29#Implementations|Implementations]]''" section 

message: Apparently Damiens and Restepc feel that the use of quotations at the right side of the article makes it feel like an advertisement.  Let me attempt to justify them.
This article currently has no images (though it could use some), and so it is essentially a gigantic wall of text.  To break up that flow, provide readers with something to look at, provide some more subjective commentary about Comet while properly sourcing it to specific individuals to avoid NPOV, and give readers some idea of what Comet developers themselves think about the technology, and also to link to a number of useful external sources without further expanding the gigantic external links section, I added a series of quotations to the right side of the article.  These fall outside the main flow of the article, and so readers uninterested in them can happily skip over them, but are in my opinion relevant and informative.
I see no particular reason to remove these, and neither Damiens nor Restepc has provided an explanation for why they should be removed, or explained how any of them is particularly unencyclopedic.
I readily admit that they lend the article a format slightly unlike many other Wikipedia articles.  But as far as I can tell, it does not fall outside the range of Wikipedia policy.
—jacobolus (t) 01:15, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think there would be much less of a problem if the quote had been added by someone who didn't know the people quoted....you actually quote yourself at one point I think Restepc (talk) 01:25, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don’t really “know” most (maybe any?) of the people quoted, other than myself of course.  I have since writing this article exchanged emails with a couple of them.  Is there any more specific problem with them than the appearance of a conflict of interest? —jacobolus (t) 01:29, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of large marginal quotations 

message: Damiens wants to completely remove the history section of this article.  I believe such a change to be unproductive, because I feel that nearly all Wikipedia articles need history sections.  Damiens, please explain what you think the ideal history section would look like for an article about a subject like this one, so we can work to form a consensus on how this article’s history section should be structured. —jacobolus (t) 01:15, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: the article almost certainly would benefit from a history section, it just needs to be a lot shorter than it is now. Restepc (talk) 01:26, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  What should be in it? What is wrong with its current length?  —jacobolus (t) 01:28, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  History section 

message: Jacob, I agree that an article about a technology (assuming this is one (see bellow)) bennefits from an "History" section. But it doesn't implies that it have to be the one that you wrote. 
A history section (of such an article) should contain some background on what led to the technology creation and then go on to explain the relevant facts since it was established. For something that is claimed to be just 2 years old, and didn't really caught-up, it's at least suspect to have such a long "history" section.
When I started trying to clean up the article, I noticed that the this section was the most broken-beyond-repair of them all, and I do believe that at this point, the article would be better without that section. 
What's follow is, as you asked, a detailed account of the problems I see in this section.
;"Server Push"
The (huge) History section starts by describing some technology used by Netscape, "Server push",  and eventually copied by IE... and then concludes that "Netscape’s server push cannot really be defined as Comet". Just in this first paragraph I can see a dozen of (overlapping!) problems. 
First, it's not Wikipedia's job to declare what can't and what cannot be described as Comet (and I explained that on my edit summary). Second, if that is not Comet, why is it in the History section? (If you really want to mention it as an relevant ancestor, for god's sake be BRIEF). Third, the whole section seem to be taken from just one self-published source (guess what? cometdaily.com). And fourth, and now for a problem that affects the article as a whole, the website cometdaily.com is terribly biased (and here I believe I'm disagreeing with Restepc as well). For instance, the article used as a "reference" for this sub-section starts with "...The increasing success of the Comet paradigm...".
;"Java Applets"
The second History-sub-section on Jacob's version of the article, entitled "Java applets", just as the previous "Server push", is also about something that is not Comet. At the end of this sub-section we're at a 15 lines-long history section that haven't talked about Comet yet. Jacob Rus, at this point, I respectfully believe that you should consider leaving the writing of the history section to some less-prolix contributor.
As a starting point for reducing this pre-History section, I would suggest removing the povs like "the ability to embed Java applets into browsers opened richer real-time options", the original research like "..User interfaces in Java applets were often buggy and frustrating for users, suffering graphical glitches..." and waseal words like "web application developers preferred to use browser-native technologies...". Since this all is not even talking about Comet, removing it shouldn't be that hard. Of course, Jacobs, remember to completely avoid to use links from the website you work for (cometdaily.com) as if they we're good sources. They are self-published and have a strong CometIsGreatSoAreWe-directed pov.
As for the last sentence of this sub-section, it's a good example of Synthesis of published material which advances a position:  "To mitigate these disadvantages, some developers—for instance, Caplin Systems in 1998—used Java applets merely as a transport mechanism (...)[23]" (or worse, since the reference [23] is not really "published", but self-published).
;"Early Comet applications"
The third section (that is still not about Comet, but just part of the "background that led to the creation of Comet") starts with plain unverifiable original research: "...Circa 2000, developers began creating the first pure-JavaScript Comet applications, using the Frame/IFrame transport". Sure. Pure and simple original research. And the original writing continues, as the article author declares that Pushlets "was the first open source Comet implementation" (make not mistake, the "reference" provided doesn't support this claim at all).
(More on "Caplin" software later)
The remaining of this sub-section simply decides what applications were the next relevant "early Comet applications",  and goes on to state some unverified facts about them. No reference for "The 2000 startup KnowNow built several Comet demonstrations..". No references for Netscape's Marc Andreessen's Bang-Networks bankrupting while trying to standardize web-push. No reference for "Comet found a niche in financial trading enterprise markets...".
In this discussion at Jacob Rus's blog  about the writing of this wikipedia article, it becomes clear what kind of "research" that was done for this section. When his cometdaily.com fellow Alessandro Alinone disagreed about (the software called) Caplin being a pioneer in "...using Comet instead of Java applets...", Jacob Rus explains that he took this information from the blog of the author of the Caplin software! Not exactly a reliable, independent source by Wikipedia's standards. (and as if it wasn't enough, this Caplin software author is also cometdaily.com fellow).
Jacob, please take this criticism prudently. Everybody commits mistakes.
;"Popularization"
The title itself is povvy. As far as I know, "Comet" is not popular. But in any case, it's just an opinion. By the way, a fix for this title was one of the my editions that were bulk-reverted.
The pov goes on with "...several prominent applications...". Some claims about googletalk, Meboo, IE go again referenced by the self-published folks at cometdaily.com. Something is said about a non-notable "'event-planning site" called Renkoo, but the reference doesn't mentions comet at all (Am I missing something?)
And at this point we have the pearl "...Meanwhile, Comet continued to make inroads into enterprise markets...". Jacob, I hope you understand how this is an unappropriated tone. This phrase has a footnote (something that also makes this article strange) saying something about "enterprise Comet companies and solutions" being created, and puts the well-established ICEfaces framework (that's not "Comet", but Ajax) side by side with Caplin (that software created by cometdaily's Martin Tyle). Not to be surprised at this point, the "reference" used is Martin Tyle's own blog at cometdaily.
The text them praises one of cometdaily's contributors for coining the term "Comet" and for "bringing attention to the approach" (POV!). Next, no source is provided for the claim that "The term quickly gained currency, and Comet became a prominent lecture topic at web-related technology conferences".
And the sub-section ends with this incredible piece: "In late 2007, the website Comet Daily assembled a group of Comet server implementors to write articles about Comet techniques and usage". That is it. The history of Comet, according to Jacob Rus, culminates with the creation of the cometdaily's website. A link to a cometdaily's press-release is used as a (verifiable, independent) source.
;"Standardization attempts"
This sections seems more appropriate as a technical discussion than as a part of "history".
Jacob Rus cites himself on his self-published blog as a reliable reference and some point. In other point the article wrongly claims that "WHATWG's HTML 5 specification attempts to standardize the Comet transport", when it makes no use of the "Comet" buzzword at all.
Some good crystal balling is used in "If HTML 5 is implemented in many browsers, Comet developers will be able to avoid the current need to implement several transports."
;"Future"
It's pov and non-sourced to claim that "Comet implementations and applications continued to proliferate". Passages with the tone of "...look no further than the Implementations section of External links, below..."  need to be ripped from this article. And of course, using a collection of links   to comet implementations as a reference of its "proliferation" is one of the best example of using primary sources I could find on Wikipedia.
The last sentence is complete pov original research: "As broadband-speed connections become ubiquitous, as the web becomes more social, and as users come to expect instant feedback, Comet stands poised for increasing adoption". Attributing it to some cometdaily contributor, or to anyone else as a matter of fact, doesn't make it less povvy. It's just an opinion, and as such, should not be stated as a fact.
;...
I think this covers the whole History section. I hope you all see how broken it is, and how desperate I became when first tried to fix it (that was why I removed it completely).
Jacob, I hope you take this criticism respectfully. I understand how you may feel attached to the article you wrote, but please don't let your feelings dominate your judgment this way.
Yours truly, 
--Damiens.rf 06:41, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problems with the History section 

message: The other main problem in Comet development is how to make it work across browsers.  I added a large section to this article about how Comet can be made to work in different browsers, because it is a topic of interest to anyone trying to understand the technology and its limitations, or trying to implement their own Comet applications.  Understanding how existing Comet transports work is necessary background to understanding the standardization attempts such as that undertaken by the WHATWG.  Damiens removed this section as well, without providing much justification.  Damiens, please clearly explain why you feel this section is not relevant or not encyclopedic, and what you think it should be replaced by, if anything.  —jacobolus (t) 01:19, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The section is basically your original research account of what web-developers liked to use to implement server-pushing. It's ok that you post your findings in your blog (as you did), but the criteria for publishing such information here on Wikipedia is a bit stronger. And of course, using your blog post as a reference (as you did) doesn't changes a thing. --Damiens.rf 08:31, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Browser hacks 

message: Damiens, you removed all the footnotes from this article.  Can you please explain why? —jacobolus (t) 01:15, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Footnotes in my experience aren't overly common in wikipedia articles, but working them into the article would be better than simple deletion Restepc (talk) 01:31, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Lack of commonality is no reason to remove them: most articles would probably benefit from more footnotes, which provide clarifications without cluttering article text.  They should be dealt with one by one, if they are truly problematic.  —jacobolus (t) 01:53, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Don't forget they were all from a single source (Comet daily blog entries) and you even quoted yourself. As a whole it looked like marketing and personal opinions from a small circle of people. I am sure you can understand the problems that arise from this situation (neutrality, conflict of interest, original research), so the consensus at the time was to remove it. Please don't take it personal. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 07:49, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  We're talking about the lettered footnotes, not the numbered citations. The two are unrelated.  —jacobolus (t) 08:04, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, my mistake. I can't remember seeing footnotes in Wikipedia articles. In that case I agree with Restepc, instead of footnotes text should be integrated into the normal article text flow. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 09:38, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of Notes 

message: I have seen that there are redirects to the Comet article, which should point to other articles in my opinion. The following is my suggestion. -83.254.208.192 (talk) 04:21, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It's interesting that there used to be an article on HTTP streaming, but Jacob Rus/Jacobolus decided to wipe it out and redirect to his preferred term "Comet", despite the discussion at the time achieved no consensus for doing so. --Damiens.rf 08:59, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I wiped nothing out, but rather merged all relevant content.  These articles were all stubs, and the Comet article mentions the alternate names prominently in its introduction.  The point is to have one article for a single concept.  I honestly don't care all that much what it is called.  At the moment, sending “HTTP streaming” and “HTTP push” to “push technology” is a bad idea, because they describe different concepts.  Likewise, “Reverse Ajax” should not be an independent article at all, as it is an alternate name for the (“Comet”) architecture described here, a name used by almost no one (all its uses originate from a single source, and the term has gained no currency as far as I can tell).  --jacobolus (t) 10:19, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  Ouch, this shouldn't have happened. I wondered why there was no HTTP streaming article. From my technical point of view 'HTTP streaming' and 'HTTP server push' are close siblings if not even synonyms for each other. Comet can be a subcategory of a streaming technology but not every HTTP streaming technology is Comet (also see comments from Lynx and Sprocketonline in other sections of this talk page). I strongly suggest to merge the old HTTP streaming article into Push technology for now, maybe it can be reinstantiated as an own article. Having commented on streaming, there also have been objections to say that 'Reverse Ajax' and 'Comet' are the same thing, in any case the term 'Reverse Ajax' has been around longer (already mentioned in 2005 ). Jacobus I start wondering on what grounds you decided that 'Comet' is the most prominent term for all these terms? - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 12:00, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I decided based on looking around the web, at the discussion of the topic, at the titles and blurbs from talks at technical conferences, at the books coming out, at the demos and applications using the technology.  Comet is by far the most popular term of the last year and a half or so.  Which name came first seems like a poor method (by that standard we would merge Istanbul and Constantinople into Byzantium).  I honestly don't care what the article is called, or what the technology gets called.  My reason for merging these articles is that they all described nearly exactly the same thing, not that I want to stomp out alternative names.  It is silly to have 5 wikipedia articles under different names, for the same concept, especially since it is easy to list off alternative names in the introduction. —jacobolus (t) 23:58, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah, it seems we may be in agreement; look below :) Restepc (talk) 01:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Long list of redirects 

message: We need a source for the claim that "Comet" was chosen as a play on Ajax as both are common household cleansers. I know this is probably truth, but...  the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. --Damiens.rf 21:25, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There are several pages of well-verifiable material that were ripped out of this article, in your path to destroy it.  Explaining the silly joke behind its name is pointless, by comparison.  Go ahead and rip it out.  Why leave the vandalism half finished? —jacobolus (t) 06:04, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: You're just being rude here. If you're not prepare to contribute to an article that will not blindly promote your agenda, consider stepping away of the process. --Damiens.rf 11:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  There is no article left to contribute to. —jacobolus (t) 14:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I hope you get back when you heal your feelings. --Damiens.rf 15:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Why would he waste his time when you've taken an excellent resource on a very popular technology and butchered it?.  Comments above such as "by a blogger named Alex" show your complete lack of understanding of the space.  Alex Russell is the co-creator of the Dojo Toolkit and Cometd, among other things, one of the most highly respected people in the world of Comet and Ajax. --Dylan.rf 06:06, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Of course he's "one of the most highly respected people in the world of Comet", he made the whole thing up! I, for one, am one of the most highly respected people in the world of Cryptoflugny (that happens to be something I invented myself). Wait until some friend of mine start writing Cryptoflugny (dancing) --Damiens.rf 20:20, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Dude, seriously?  Come on now, see Greg's post below.  How do you think the term Ajax came to be?  Someone (Jesse James Garrett) in the field came up with a term to describe a group of techniques.  Comet accomplishes the same thing, and is widely used across the industry (again, see Greg's post below).  Or, take a look at the list of projects on Google Code and Sourceforge that use the term Comet, or the number of implementations on the original page before you removed the list.  If Wikipedia doesn't want this information, that's a shame.  I still don't really understand your objection to the work done by Jacob over many months with community feedback?  It doesn't really matter... the content is open source anyways, I just don't understand why you feel the information presented is not useful?  Your objections listed above seem pedantic and it feels like the goal of creating a great resource of useful information is being ignored by your desire for a process that I fail to understand.  If any of the open source software projects I contribute to behaved in the manner you have behaved in, I would be embarrassed and ashamed. --Dylan.rf 00:08, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Full disclosure here, as Restepc has accused me of WP:CANVASSing “against” him.  Dylan, knowing that I wrote most of the Wikipedia article here, sent me an email yesterday asking me what was happening with this Wiki page, to which I have just responded, a day after his comments here, suggesting to him that discussion on the talk page is the method by which Wikipedia disputes are resolved.  I have no interest in compromising wikipedia process, and Dylan speaks for himself. —jacobolus (t) 02:26, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

text: Damiens, trivializing this discussion with absurd straw man arguments does not further your position. —jacobolus (t) 02:31, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  common household cleansers  

message: I have reverted the piece taken from the original article that used to define "Comet" as an "Ajax-based web application architecture"", to the more realistic and less far-fetched "a flavour of Ajax". I believe giving this neologism the status of an architecture is overly pompous.  --Damiens.rf 12:19, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: What the hell is a “flavor” of Ajax?  That is unsourced meaningless babble and is not suitable for Wikipedia. —jacobolus (t) 19:36, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Please chill out and read my (upcoming) comment on the section below. --Damiens.rf 22:05, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  Not very constructive, and you know there are also other people who call it a flavour of Ajax. -- 213.115.160.102 (talk) 16:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  The original is much better, it is indeed an application architecture. Flavor is less specific. In the article 213.115.160.102 quotes, in addition to saying it is a 'flavor of Ajax', also says: 'Comet uses a modified form of the canonical Ajax architecture' and then goes on to describe the ARCHITECTURAL differences. Furthermore, 'web application architecture' gives wide context, which 'Ajax-based' further refines. It is much better than 'a flavour of Ajax'. Damien, you are the one being pompous in your rigid fight against this 'neologism'. Your continued focus on it being a new word coined by several 'evangelists' points to your bias against it. Who cares if it has similarity to previous architectures, or that it is a subset of 'Ajax' technologies (Ajax is also a neologism, OOOO!!!!) We create words as we need a shorter way of mentioning complex concepts. It facilitates communication. Please don't work against simple, organic progress.63.64.108.5 (talk) 18:21, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  At the end of the day, Comet is not even a flavour/variation of Ajax, it is Ajax (long) polling? - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 22:12, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Introduction / Purpose of "Comet" 

message: I've just noticed I have accidentally removed a paragraph that mentioned html5 and json (I though I was just reading a removed mention of json). I'm sorry for that. But re-reading the paragraph, I have doubts if it should be re-added as it is:
:"Two standards, Crockford’s JSONRequest and HTML5’s Server-sent events, have been proposed to ease the adoption of Comet-like technology. Neither has seen widespread browser adoption or use"
First, I believe that characterizing things like HTML5’s Server-sent events as "Comet-like technology"reveals an implicit slight pov: Considering the influence of each one, it's more like that "Comet" is a "HTML5’s Server-sent events"-like technology.
And second, we should avoid a kind o loose writing the permeated the old version of the article, where the article tries to guess the motivations behind everyone's steps: "...have been proposed to ease the adoption of...". We should not infer  the reasons for the proposal of these standards (let alone to stated that the reason is to allow Commet to be used).
The loose language is seen again with "Neither has seen widespread browser adoption...". Since we have any sources, this is solely based on the author's experience (and thus is original research). In any case, as far as I know, html5 is just a planed proposal. No "widespread browser adoption" should be expected at this point (but the paragraph makes it sound otherwise). --Damiens.rf 12:35, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The reason I put that paragraph, is that when I removed “JSONRequest” from the list of alternate names for Comet, the anon contributor who had added it reverted my removal.  So by way of explanation, when I moved it out of the list of alternate names again, I instead described what it actually is.  It seems perfectly reasonable to leave JSONRequest out of this current article, stub that it is. —jacobolus (t) 19:25, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  No it isn't "perfectly reasonable", stop acting like in a highschool debate club. The reason it is in because it is a push technology with JavaScript on the client side... it can't get much closer to what Comet is, compared to e.g. Pushlets which is also listed and use a different programming language. I think you try to water down this article as much as possible, in the past you did not give bare facts but mystifications instead. One reason I could think of why you are doing this is that in an attempt to lobby for Comet you try to weaken or hide all related web interaction technologies (so far: deleting articles, removing related technology terms, ridicolus claims about how popular Comet is, etc). -- 213.115.160.102 (talk) 16:33, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Erm… Damiens.rf removed it, and I termed his removal reasonable, in an attempt to be conciliatory.  I have no interest in “weakening” “related technologies”.  (aside: out of curiosity, do you understand technically what JSONRequest is, who uses it, which browsers support it, which standards bodies have discussed it, etc?) I did merge several synonymous terms into one article, in an attempt at consolidating the information about a single topic.  Please explain which claims of Comet popularity are ridiculous—I certainly am not aiming at ridicule here—and which explanations are mystical. —jacobolus (t) 14:28, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  ComeComet-like technology standards proposals 

message: Since we're re-writing the article from stub, there's no need to keep non-cited information in the article. I've just removed some disputed pieces. Anyone should feel free to re-add them with proper sources. --Damiens.rf 12:43, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation needed 

message: That source is all the article has for the 'definition' of comet; if you want to remove it you'll need to find a better one, if you can't even find a source for the definition we're not going to get anywhere. Restepc (talk) 20:14, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Go ahead and put the article at AfD if you like.  Or go look through the dozens of sources that were previously linked: each one was specifically chosen because it was worthwhile for interested readers.  The Ajaxian source, as well as the nameless mailing list post, are both throw-away sources, apparently used to give the appearance of legitimacy to this stub, like putting lipstick on a pig.  Neither one is worth linking readers to, and using the former to justify calling Comet a “flavor” is intellectually dishonest. —jacobolus (t) 20:21, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I do not recall there being any sources at all in the introduction of your article. Which source from the old article would you suggest using for the definition? Restepc (talk) 20:30, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

text: I am sure you understand why Wikipedia editors prefer external references over personal opinions.  - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 08:00, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removal of secondary source 

message: * 
This book on ajax by McGraw-Hill refers to comet as a "networking pattern" at page 280 , and then as a "...push-style communication pattern generally dubbed Comet..." at pages 483 and 515, and as a "...push-oriented communication pattern..." at page 516. I believe it means a desing pattern when it says pattern. 
I suggest we use this terminology on the leading paragraph. --Damiens.rf 22:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leading paragraph (or "what's comet anyway?") 

message: The link to comet implementations was really just a link to cometd implementations (the d is significant).
Here is an initial list of companies/products/projects that self describe as comet.   I think this should be on the main page, but not sure where?
* http://cometd.org/
* http://lightstreamer.com/
* http://webtide.com/
* http://www.freeliberator.com/
* http://code.google.com/p/erlycomet/
* http://java.sun.com/javaee/community/glassfish/
* http://code.google.com/p/pi-js/
* http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-6.0-doc/aio.html
* http://www.kaazing.com/  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gregwilkins (talk • contribs) 01:49, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedia isn't a link directory, but a few examples of notable things that use comet (and more importantly say themselves that they use comet (or streaming ajax or whatever they call it that we're all agreed is the same thing)) in the article would be useful. Restepc (talk) 09:36, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I suggest that entries need to have an existing Wikipedia article. Some projects describe themself as "Comet-like" (does that qualify as Comet or not, do they simply mean "Ajax push"?), perhaps we should wait until a definition was agreed on to be able to verify that everyone speaks about the same. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 12:15, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yes, they almost assuredly qualify as Comet (though as discussed above I think these links are somewhat problematic).  Some developers have come to the conclusion that “Comet” is limited to a particular transport.  “Ajax push” and “Comet” are synonymous in this instance.  The definition as this Wikipedia article stated it a few weeks ago predominates, but I'm not sure what exactly you would like to verify.  Can you better explain your confusion? —jacobolus (t) 01:57, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Can you please calm down, it is getting harder to talk to you. The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability. When developers use a vague description like "Ajax and Comet-like" the question arises if they know what Comet means, therefore if the product uses Comet (or just some sort of server push). For Wikipedia editors this means we need an agreed and comprehensive definition of Comet. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 06:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I am perfectly calm, and I am not seeing the difficulty of discussion you reference.  It is indeed unclear whether some of those developers have a precise idea what Comet means, but that doesn’t mean that their products do not “use Comet”.  Indeed “just some sort of server push” sent to a javascript callback in the browser is the same thing as “Comet”.  The definition is widely agreed upon, even if still murky for some minority.  I’m not sure what you mean by comprehensive, and I still don’t understand your general confusion about the definition.  Can you further clarify?  —jacobolus (t) 08:10, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Not sure if everyone agrees with you. Some people think of Comet as an Ajax design pattern, for you everything that pushes or long-polls JavaScript is Comet (strange that you accept pushed XMLHttpRequest but tried to remove JSONRequest Duplex), for others JavaScript is not even needed (Pushlets) and it describes EVERY non-static web development. Do you see the problem for Wikipedia editors of not having a clear comprehensive definition when categorising software? - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 09:01, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  The use of JSONRequest to send real-time updates would be “Comet”.  JSONRequest itself is merely a proposed but unlikely-to-ever-be-used-in-the-real-world Comet transport.  Most uses of Pushlets, as far as I know, are “Comet”, and I have seen the general idea of sending real-time events to browsers referred to as “Pushlets”, in sources written before there was a more widely accepted name.  I'm not sure what you mean by “every non-static web development”.  Those who call Comet “an Ajax design pattern” are not using the normally understood technical definition of “design pattern” for such usage. —jacobolus (t) 11:24, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  That's funny, describing JSONRequest and Ajax as "Comet transports". Perhaps all web technologies are "Comet core technologies" and HTTP the primary "Comet transfer protocol". :) However, you didn't answer my question, how can editors categorise implementations (Comet software) without having a definition of the concept?  - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 15:02, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Will the anonymous editors please login and sign their posts!!! (pot calling kettle black) Gregwilkins (talk) 14:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  Nobody is asking wikipedia editors to go around "categorising software".   The products and projects cited all self classify as comet.  So when a reader finds JSR315 saying that it addresses the comet use-case or the lightstream product saying it is a comet server or jquery providing a comet client, some of them might like to turn to wikipeadia to find out what the term means.  The self describers obviously believe that term contains enough meaning that further explanation is not required!  OK, so the self describers are not 100% consistent in their use of the term comet and there is some degree of ambiguity.   But that is exactly why it would be valuable for wikipeadia to have a longer article that describes (with citation) the different uses of the term comet and the different technologies to which the phrase has been applied.  I can't believe that you expect 100% external agreement on the meaning of a term before you will allow any detail to be included on wikipedia.   Surely if there are conflicting citations, then both should be listed with text saying that they are in conflict? Gregwilkins (talk) 14:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  You can't win!   First you demand citations, and when they are provided you say "wikipedia is not a link directory".   I give up - Bye Gregwilkins (talk) 15:47, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe you should try not seeing discussions about how to improve the Encyclopedia as something one can win or loose. --Damiens.rf 20:25, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  JSONRequest is a “Comet transport”.  “Ajax” is an application architecture (just as “Comet”, but “Ajax” has a looser definition than “Comet” does).  HTTP is indeed a “protocol”, but I’m not sure what that has to do with anything.  The definition of “Comet” is rather simple, and I don’t understand your difficulty with it.  Maybe try emailing Alex Russell and he can try to explain it to you himself?  In any case, what does any of this have to do with categorizing implementations? (And note, I have not suggested that wikipedia editors should categorize implementations). —jacobolus (t) 23:41, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

text: Who are these “self-describers”?  What is the definitional problem?  What are these different technologies?  Comet can use a number of possible “transports”, which were incredibly well described by the previous article. —jacobolus (t) 23:41, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comet implementations 

message: I added a picture of a server to the article, as an image always makes things look better IMO. It wasn't perfect for the topic though and has been removed, does anyone know of a more appropriate image we could use? Restepc (talk) 09:19, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I would be happy to add images, but it is not worth it given the current state of this article —jacobolus (t) 01:57, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

text: Sounds like a good idea, a picture says more than a thousand words. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 09:28, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image 

message: The current opening paragraph of this page (on 15 June) is close to a pretty good definition of what comet is.   But I have two niggles with the definition.  Firstly, is the "long-lived HTTP connections" phrase.  I know this phrase is used in the cited articles for the definition, but this really relates to specific transports (used at the time) and is also confusing as it is really long held HTTP requests that these transport rely on.   Also there are non HTTP implmentations that use a pure TCP/IP socket available from the flash plugin as a transport.   The question I have about these, is that the use of flash plugin may render these transports non-Ajax?
This brings me to my second niggle: the definition does not make it clear that comet is a subset of Ajax.   But while there are many article that do describe Comet as an Ajax technique, the original coining of the term only says that it is Ajax-like.  So perhaps the use of a flash-plugin is OK - in which case non-HTTP transports are probably OK.
So I think both these niggles go to the heart of the current lack of an agreed definition for the word comet.  Specifically small disconnects between the original coining of the term and what I believe to be it's current usage.   However, as wikipedia is not the place for original thought, I guess we cannot resolve this disconnect here.
Thus I'd like to propose to slightly defocus the current definition, so that it does not lean one way or the other with these niggles.    I'll update the definition accordingly, but I'm not 100% committed these changes and will take no great offense if they are backed out.    I'll start some efforts elsewhere to resolve these questions, so the definition can be tighted up here.
Gregwilkins (talk) 00:45, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Definition of Comet? 

message: I'm getting pretty tired of this "if it's not sourced it's not true" kind of attitude. There was a lot of good information in that article. Rather than scrapping it and replacing it with what is essentially a stub why not go back and try to source areas without citation? Bactoid (talk) 14:23, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The threshold is not truth, but verifiability. And lack of reliable sources was just one out of the many problems this article had. --Damiens.rf 14:51, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Don't bite. WP:V isn't going anywhere, but many of the newcomers from Reddit will go. And Bactoid has a point: excision is the last line of defense for unverified technical content in a non-BLP article. This is only a controversy because someone amputated instead of treating the wound. --- tqbf 15:50, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  The threshold is verifiability -- that is, "is able to be verified", not "has already been verified and cited".  68.42.74.83 (talk) 22:43, 19 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stop this madness! 

message: There's a little too much detail at some points that would be better off just being linked to in a one-liner. For example, the web architecture comparison. It seems better to just mention the other architectures and focus on what Comet is, not what it isn't. Also, since Comet Daily was created to promote Comet, it may be difficult to include quotes from them and we should get rid of anything that smells like an ad. --OMouse (talk) 14:11, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ad/PR-Hits and too much technical detail 

message: The old version of the article which many of you are reverting to was not removed because of overly technical details but because it was almost all Original Research, written by one editor to advertise his website, including adding quotes from himself and his colleagues. There was originally an attempt to address specific problems/sections in the article as some of you are suggesting, but this was met by bulk reverting and edit warring.
The current 'consensus' version is a work in progress and any help improving it is appreciated, but please do not revert to cometdailys version. Restepc (talk) 15:58, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I see the article is now protected thankfully....on the advert version for now, but oh well. Restepc (talk) 16:00, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I assume someone is writing a RFC as I type this (or someone will be soon at any rate), I'll wait until it's up and running and work on a well thought out description of events from my view when it is. strikeout, see discussion below. I suggest the page protection is left for now, even though it's protected on what I think is the 'wrong' version, to prevent further edit warring and let things calm down....perhaps the protection should remain until after the RFC is finished. I also advise against admins being over zealous with blocks, I believe the majority of these reddit people are acting in good faith, if misguidedly. Restepc (talk) 16:20, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  ATTN REDDIT PEOPLE 

message: Toddst1 and I have both fully protected this article.  We did so following discussion on the Administrators' Noticeboard, and the article should remain protected until community discussion can resolve the content dispute.  It happens that the longer version of the article is the one that we protected, this is by pure happenstance and does not reflect our opinion one way or the other.  Canderson7 (talk) 16:12, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Under the circumstances I strongly support your actions. Restepc (talk) 16:21, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. Canderson7 (talk) 16:26, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text: Thanks for the so-much-needed intervention. Please, stick with us since we'll benefit from some admin oversight on the upcoming rfc. --Damiens.rf 16:35, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure thing.  I'll be here.  Canderson7 (talk) 16:37, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Article Fully Protected

message: The below is intended to give a description of events from my point of view, it contains some speculation on my part, and my opinions on what has happened as well as simple facts, feel free to mentally insert the phrases 'I think' and 'In my view/opinion' as necessary.
I have the COI noticeboard on my watchlist, and responded to this post, which now includes some further discussion. 
I observed on the article a minor edit war between Damiens, Jacob and an anonymous user I've taken to calling IP Guy.
It appeared that Damiens had started to edit 'Jacobs version' after being of the opinion that it needed changing considerably for a wide variety of reasons.
Jacob bulk reverted his edits and the edit war began, IP guy joined in on Jacobs side on the basis that Damiens wasn't engaging in discussion on the talk page and Jacob was repeatedly inviting him to. 
When I came to the article I attempted to stop the edit war and get Damiens onto the talk page. Myself and IP guy quickly came to the conclusion that Damiens was more than justified in his edits, and Jacobs version was severely unsuitable for wikipedia. It also became clear that Jacob did indeed have huge COI/Vanity problems with the article.
After some discussion I once again changed the article to 'Damiens version', which although not perfect I feel was a massive improvement. 
Jacob started up the edit war again, so I left it and suggested that it may be best to simply stub the article and rewrite it from scratch. After a few days of discussion (plagued by incivility, some from Damiens but mostly from Jacob) a consensus of 3v1 in favour of my suggestion was reached, and I personally was (and still am tbh) of the opinion that Jacobs opinion should be ignored due to his severe COI problems. Although 3 people is a small consensus, the only opposing view was that of Jacob, who was arguing that his version should be left as it was, which I'm almost certain every experienced neutral editor will agree is not an option.
So on the back of those discussions I stubbed the article with a basic definition (which I got dead wrong knowing nothing about the subject myself), with the intention of going back to Jacobs version and salvaging what useful information/sources there was. Four things happened that stopped the article making much progress at all: Jacobs attitude became even less civil/more disruptive, it emerged that there is no universally agreed definition of comet in the first place, I didn't actually get the time to salvage anything, and a handful of other people from cometdaily turned up on the article and enlongated/complicated all discussions/edits. Jacob has been edit warring throughout.
I would like to note at this point that all the 'comet daily' people with the exception of Jacob have acted in good faith and Greg in particular has been helpful. The article appeared to be slowly beginning to get somewhere when someone canvassed reddit and an edit war erupted between the new consensus version and Jacobs version. Mine and Damiens user pages were also vandalised.
I think there are three options to be discussed, in all cases the version of the article that should be used is simply a starting point, they all need a lot of work.
1 Start working from 'Jacobs version'
2 Start working from 'Damiens version'
3 Start working from 
'consensus/stub version'
I am also very concerned by the canvassing which all common sense suggests has taken place, but would suggest keeping that issue and the issue of how to proceed on the article seperate. Restepc (talk) 18:23, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Those are, indeed, the options. Now, (1) which of them do you favor, and (2) what steps do you propose we take to get from that option to "good article candidate"? --- tqbf 18:41, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Comet Daily is a Self-Published Source. WP doesn't "lag" on this issue; WP:SPS issues come up constantly. Limited citation from a popular, highly relevant SPS seems reasonable. But accepting that SPS as a blanket valid source and using it to wholesale lift promo copy into a WP article is obviously not reasonable. It is unlikely that this RFC is going to end with a consensus that "if it appears on Comet Daily, it's fair game". --- tqbf 18:59, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree, no reason to accept CometDaily as a 'blanket valid source', what I mean is, to find the right way forward, we need to define what kind of limited citation is appropriate. I read the SPS guidelines, and it seems that the relevant guidlines are 1) Self-published sources may only be used as sources about themselves 2) The material used is relevant to their notability 3) it is not contentious. The information regarding 'Comet' is largely found in such sources, and so perhaps a reasonable approach to this article would be detailing the specific definitions of various writers that self identify as 'Comet' developers (e.g. Alex, Jacob, Greg, etc.). 63.64.108.5 (talk) 19:10, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I add the obvious clarification that the COMET developers themselves can never write directly in this article and cite themselves and their status as a source --- that's the definition of WP:OR. I may have misread you, though, so no response necessary.  --- tqbf 19:17, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text: I propose option 2. Revision 1 is damaged beyond repair, so I don't think we need to even look at it. Damien's revision has a lot of good information in it, and I'd say about 2/3 of the article could stay as-is (if we can find more sources to prove them). Most of the stuff that doesn't belong can simply be deleted; there isn't much that needs to be rewritten in that version. My two cents. — FatalError 18:55, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  It would be helpful if you could enumerate the damage in Jacobs version, so we don't have to guess as to what your issues are from a diff. --- tqbf 19:00, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Comment can you expand on what you qualify as "damaged beyond repair"? The version that "has a lot of good information  in it" is a stub comprised of four sentences. Is that really what you intended to state? I want to make sure I'm understanding you statement correctly. Thanks, AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:04, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I once wrote a detailed line-by-line analysis of the History section, explaining the many problems that permeate the article. That was a reply to a request by Jacob, but it was ignored. You may still read it above at #Problems_with_the_History_section. --Damiens.rf 19:16, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Strong agree with everything in Damiens.rf's critique of the "History" section of this article. --- tqbf 19:18, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Agree much of the History section - is synthesis or not of real value to the article. Also agree with Damien's statement "A history section (of such an article) should contain some background on what led to the technology creation and then go on to explain the relevant facts since it was established - However, this does not constitute "damaged beyond repair."  The baby should not be thrown out with the bathwater, and I'd support building from version 1 beginning with a remove of much of the editorializing, and synthesis, and CN tagging (but not removing) unsourced statements. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:29, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  I also agree with much of the criticism of the History section, though I also disagree with much of it.  Damiens’s line-by-line analysis mixes alternating excellent points with frivolous hyperbole.  I will try to respond in more depth sometime tomorrow or in the next few days.  Most of his conclusions boil down to concerns about inadequate sourcing.  It would be wonderful if, among other things, many more sources could be tracked down and cited. —jacobolus (t) 19:44, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  I believe the main point of confusion to be differing interpretations of the purpose of this section.  I wrote it to describe the history of the model/pattern/architecture that is Comet—the thing itself—while Damiens wants it to be mainly a history of the term Comet and its usage.  The same misunderstanding is evident in other conflicts, such as whether alternate names for the same technology, including Pushlets and Reverse Ajax, and the largest section of the article about Push technology, should be merged into this article, or whether those should instead duplicate all this content several times.  If this article discussed only the term, as a word, then having those all be separate articles would be much more reasonable.  —jacobolus (t) 19:55, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text: What do you think should be done about the content here? --- tqbf 20:01, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I have not reduced the article size in just one edit. I have done that in almost 40 edits, so that they could be contested independently (i.e., fixing the article instead of blanking it). Jacob refused to address the my concerns independently and insisted on bulk reverting. --Damiens.rf 20:24, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Perhaps you didn't see the 'sequence of edits'? Or the plural 'edits' at the end? I never said you did just one edit.63.64.108.5 (talk) 20:28, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  (edit conflict) Just a comment. Where does he say you did it in one edit? They state "began a sequence of edits" - and gave a diff that was illustrative of the type of edit, and a place to start from. Generally speaking, it's good to shy away from editing other peoples comments. You should make your response below his. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 20:30, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I have a problem with "and summarized with this diff:...". I don't agree that diff is illustrative of the type of edit. --Damiens.rf 20:42, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I added 'in approximately 46 commented edits'... The purpose of the diff is not to point a finger, but to provide a basis from which to rebuild the content  63.64.108.5 (talk) 20:51, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text: I also should add that I don't mean to imply that all of your edits are biased or unmerited. Many were good. But there is an overall defensiveness to the tone of your edit comments. It is that defensiveness that I find to be biased 63.64.108.5 (talk) 20:55, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  I notice one of the other issues brought up here is the preponderance of references to a single web site; it should be noted that useful reference material on Comet is fairly abundant. See, for example: 1 (from an independently-notable industry figure), 2 (from a public university), 3 (from the coiner of the term "Comet"), etc., and the JavaScript-themed commentary blog Ajaxian has a topical archive of Comet material and references as well.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ubernostrum (talk • contribs) 00:41, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Restepc's view (and comments) 

message: I'm working the sandbox version of the article. I removed what I would categorize as 'commentary'. I broke the notes in the process (setting the out of order by one) which Jacobolus pointed out when the edit was reverted . Regarding the other notes though, if there is something pertinent to an explanation, why not integrate into the body of the article and do away with the notes section entirely. For example, the origin of the term "Comet" can easily be spoken to and sourced in the body of the article. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 18:49, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Those were things I found irrelevant to the main narrative of the article, and therefore not worth interrupting its flow for (but still relevant enough to the topic, and some readers, to keep in a note). —jacobolus (t) 18:55, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I think the "This is not a criticism of Wikipedia" needs to be done away with - it adds little value. Note #1 about the name 'Comet' can be slightly expanded upon and sourced in the lead, eliminating the need for that note. Generally speaking, I don't think these notes add much on their own, because as you said, they aren't relevant to the main 'narrative'. If they are important place them in the body of the article. Comments? AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:02, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There was already a discussion along these lines where (IMV) the consensus (only Jacob objected that I recall) was that the notes should be removed with any relevant information worked into the article. Restepc (talk) 19:12, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I think that's fair. Jacobolus, do you agree? AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:25, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  No.  Discuss them case by case. —jacobolus (t) 19:36, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Ok. We are addressing "A" below. I'll address "C". What is the justification for noting that a technical explanation of portion of wikipedia is "not a criticism"? As I've stated, I don't think it adds much. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:46, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  We are going to make any progress if we expect Jacob's blessing for ever edit we want to make. He's reverting most of what's being fixed in the sandbox version, and he repeatedly asks for more and more discussions for every topic, no matter how clear is the consensus we've reached. Jacob refuses to accept the consensus for fixing the History section, he refuses to accept the (broad) consensus of removing the quotations, refuses to accept the (broad) consensus of removing the notes... and mainly, he refuses to accept the consensus that Comet Daily editors should contribute to the discussion but avoid directly editing the article. --Damiens.rf 19:47, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you, Damiens, that jacobolus could greatly expedite this process if he stopped reverting so many edits and stone-walling so many changes.  On the other hand, though, other editors could expedite the process by justifying themselves briefly on the talk page before making edits to the sandbox that push the limits of consensus.  Additionally, I do not believe that it was ever decided that Comet Daily editors should not edit the sandbox.  I, for one, would disagree with such a measure. Canderson7 (talk) 19:58, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  I would very much like to see the history section “fixed”, I think that some quotations can be removed, others worked into the text, and some left, but I do not think that any of these changes have nearly the “broad consensus” you think.  I have no interest in “stone-walling” anything.  I am however interested in having a comprehensive, accessible, high-quality product. —jacobolus (t) 20:10, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  I agree.  Take it out.  Just renumber the other notes. —jacobolus (t) 20:07, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

text:  Putting more information about the name “Comet” in the lead section adds a pro-Comet (as a term) POV to the article (i.e. unless every other name’s origin is equally described), and is distracting for readers simply trying to figure out what it is.  It could probably be worked into the history section though. —jacobolus (t) 19:36, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  The article itself is named Comet (programming). It is not unreasonable to explain to the reader why it has such name, and where it came from, while also acknowledging it is not the exclusive term for, HTTP Push/Server push, etc. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 19:46, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don’t think that is particularly beneficial to the lead section, being mostly a distraction from a technical summary of what Comet is, and I think it reads fine to leave it in a note, or in the history section.  But it could potentially also be made into a short section immediately after the introduction.  I suppose it depends on the audience is of the article.  My expectation is that they’d care more about the definition than its etymology. How do you imagine the lead section would go, with such an explanation worked in? —jacobolus (t) 20:15, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  It doesn't explicitly need to be in the lead section, it could go in those other places as well. For example the AJAX article has similar info in the "history" section. The main thing is it doesn't need a note. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 20:29, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Canderson7 has addressed this in their most recent edit, discussed above. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 03:27, 22 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Notes Section. Necessary?  

message: The article as it stands is very inconsistent with its usage of the term HTTP Connection vs HTTP Request.  The reason for this is that comet articles and documents themselves are often lax in making the distinction between these two things.   
HTTP/1.0 and HTTP/1.1 both support persistent TCP/IP connections, over which many request/response pairs may be sent without closing the connection.  This is totally orthoganol to comet.  Thus the definition of comet should not be about long held HTTP connections - as most browser that implement HTTP/1.1 will hold the TCP/IP connection open for long periods of time.   Comet uses long held HTTP Requests!    The definition of long-polling says: "After sending such an event, the server closes the connection, and the browser immediately opens a new one.", when it really should say: "After sending such an event, the server completes the HTTP response and the browser issues a new HTTP request to obtain further events"   - not that there is no requirement of immediate as both DWR and cometd support configurable pauses between long polls.   
I know this as a fact as a comet expert, but it is difficult to cite this as it is a very common mistake to for comet documentation to use the word connection, when request should be used.  So the summary sections of many cited articles will say connection, but the detail will talk about request.   This confusion is something that really should be pointed out... but I guess that would be OR.   I don't want to update this page myself... as I'm probably too close to this.  But I will seek to have an article published that discusses this frequent mistake and also search for other citations, so that this page can at least refer to the issue.   If a neutral editor wanted to read the details of the cited articles and see that indeed it is requests held (not connections), then it would be great if they updated this page to 
reflect that.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gregwilkins (talk • contribs) 06:55, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Please just change the places where 'connection' should say 'request'.  Those changes shouldn't change the verifiability of the content. —jacobolus (t) 18:17, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Connection vs Request 

message: I've just implemented a pretty major edit that I've been working on for the past day or so.  Here's a quick breakdown of what I did and why:  
I first tackled the "Web application architectures" section.  This is the only section from which I actually removed content.  My overall goal was to keep the article focused on Comet and to avoid vague and thus potentially POV wordings.  I also reorganized this section so that it now focuses only on Comet's predecessors.  Considering that Comet is the whole point of this article, ===Comet=== seemed somewhat incongruous.  I instead formed a new section in the article called "Implementation of Comet".  As I said earlier on this talk page, I wanted a reader to be able to look at the table of contents and know where to click to find technical information on Comet that is less niche-oriented than "horizontal scalability."  I think this new section does that.  Much of its content comes from the old Comet subheading.  I also merged into it the material from the "browser compatibility" section, a section that was not really about Comet support in various browsers but instead about different methods for implementing Comet.  I tried to give the new section structure by tapping the streaming vs. long polling dichotomy.  However, my efforts in that regard could use some expert review.  In particular, I wasn't sure how server-sent events should fit in (as is obvious from the fact that I gave it its own subheading).  Anyway, you can see what I was trying to do and hopefully you can improve on my treatment of the topic.
Once I got down to the scalability section, I found that less and less revision became necessary.  The technical material is well-written and comprehensive.  The one thing that I did do was merge most of the notes into the article.  Often a really cool piece of information was hidden away at the bottom of the page when it made just as much sense in the middle of the body.  I did leave two of the notes, because I though incorporating them would disrupt the flow.  I also created a note of my own.  Throughout my editing, I removed peacock terms and POV words wherever I found them (such as "unfortunately" from the "Multipart XHR" section).
Overall, it's my opinion that the article is easier to use and less POV than before.  I would appreciate it, though, if the experts would look over what I did and make sure that the accuracy of the article's content has been preserved.  A couple other things that need attention are the following, in no particular order:
*The pub/sub section seems a little out of place under horizontal scalability.
*Several people are addressed by name in the article, but it is never made clear who they are or why we should care what they have to say.  For instance: Michael Carter in the horizontal scalability section.
*Should there be a section that clearly outlines disadvantages / criticisms of Comet?
*When should Comet be italicized.  Right now it sometimes is and sometimes isn't?
*There remain instances of original research or uncited material that I have not yet had time to tag.
Those critiques notwithstanding, I think the article is coming along really well.  I've removed the advert tag from the list of problems, because I think that most of the concerns in that direction were dealt with by this last edit. Please comment.  Canderson7 (talk) 22:25, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There is no particular reason Michael should be mentioned; I attributed that statement to him because despite being good advice, it is certainly not a universal point of view (at least judging from some systems people have actually built);  Yes, there should be some integrated criticism, though I don't know whether it will be easy/possible to find reliable sources making well-argued criticisms;  Comet should be italicized when the term itself is being discussed as a term, while it should remain roman when referring to the concept.  I’ll actually take a look at your edit in detail in a few days, and comment on it. —jacobolus (t) 01:19, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Best of luck.  I'll have internet access again in a week.  Hopefully things will have come along well. Canderson7 (talk) 17:17, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reorganization 

message: Please note that Reverse Ajax is not the same as Comet. Reverse Ajax is any way to get asynchronous data from the server to the browser, and includes polling, comet and piggyback. For more information, see http://directwebremoting.org/dwr/reverse-ajax. JoeWalker (talk) 09:10, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you please add a comment also to Talk:Reverse Ajax which Jacobolus wants to merge/delete (Quote from Jacobolus: everything said on this article [Reverse Ajax] is explained in great detail at the Comet page). - 62.127.211.2 (talk) 10:11, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

text: Since it "includes comet", and is an older term, then I guess it's correct to say that the "concept comet" was (among other concepts) once called reverse-ajax. --Damiens.rf 20:25, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

text: Can we please merge it with buzzwords next?. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 22:38, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Honestly, if you think that would provide a better explanation for readers trying to understand how real-time data can be sent to web browsers, then be WP:BOLD.  I suspect other editors would disagree with you.  I really have no attachment to the name “Comet”—if it stopped being used tomorrow, I wouldn’t bat an eye, though I think having some understood term for it is potentially useful—but I want Wikipedia to have a decent explanation of this technology, both accessible and comprehensive, and I want it under a single title, because many are curious about it, and go to Wikipedia as the first step when trying to learn about something new, and putting several low-quality versions of the same article with slightly different titles serves them poorly. —jacobolus (t) 00:31, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If "Comet" really stopped being used tomorrow, would you change the name of your software from "Cometd" to something else? --Damiens.rf 03:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Given that I have nothing to do with Cometd, I doubt I could change its name.  But I think Orbited would be a fine name for a streaming web server, with or without the pun.  —jacobolus (t) 04:58, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Oops... my mistake. I could have asked "Would you prefer "Comet" to be called "Orbit"?"... but nevermind... I've lost this joke. --Damiens.rf 12:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reverse Ajax 

message: I believe it's worth pointing to Reverse Ajax in the See Also section, since it's a parallel (if not equivalent) term. Removing the link in the basis that the article on Reverse Ajax is not in good shape at this moment doesn't seem to be a valid argument (this article is also not good). Fixing Reverse Ajax would be the proper thing to do. Does anyone have any good reason no to include Reverse Ajax in the see also section? --Damiens.rf 14:21, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Regarding the Diff . Why not simply wiki-link Reverse Ajax in the lead "...including Ajax Push,[1] Reverse Ajax,[2] and HTTP server push[3] among others." AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 14:38, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point. Linked. --Damiens.rf 16:25, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

text: Yup even better - 62.127.211.2 (talk) 17:30, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

text: Take a look at WP:ALSO. —jacobolus (t) 03:12, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  See Also section 

message: I found about a book by O'Reilly that, among other things, describes the "hidden-frame" technique for building dynamic applications. There are other reliable books that talk about this. Fortunately, we no longer need to rely on 'cometdaily' blog-posts to source these passages in the article. 
For now, I've replaced a piece about the 'downsides' of hidden iframes (that used to be based on Jacob Rus self-published original research) by content based on what is said on the published book. 
Maybe more changes are needed in the paragraph to conform it with what is said on reliable sources. --Damiens.rf 16:09, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hidden IFrame