[antonvs]

> Where every line ends with \r\n, also known as CRLF, for Carriage Return + Line Feed, that's right, HTTP is based on teletypes, which are just remote typewriters

Does it need to be pointed out that this is complete bullshit?

[a1369209993]

Well, I've definitely seen a lot of people claim (generally not word-for-word) that using a pointlessly-overlong encoding of newline that exists to cater to the design deficiencies of hardware from the nineteen-sixties is not bullshit, so... maybe? But only for rather mushy values of "need".

[kortex]

It's not totally right, but it's not totally wrong, either, kind of like the way the dimensions of the space shuttle booster are directly affected by the size of a pair of Roman war horses' asses.

CRLF was used verily heavily and thus got baked into a lot of different places. Namely, it conveniently sidesteps the ambiguity of "some systems use CR, others use LF" by just putting both in, and since they are whitespace, there's not much downside other than the extra byte.

Beyond that, there are many other clear and obvious connections between Hypertext Transfer Protocol and teletype machines. Many early web browsers were expected to be teletype machines [0]. So while it might be a bit of a stretch, I'd say this is far from "complete bullshit".

[0] - http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/Proposal.html#:~:text=it%2...

[antonvs]

> kind of like the way the dimensions of the space shuttle booster are directly affected by the size of a pair of Roman war horses' asses.

I agree the two are similar, but the space shuttle story is also bullshit. See e.g. Snopes: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/railroad-gauge-chariots/

People are suckers for plausible-sounding and amusing stories, that one's classic bait for people's lack of critical thinking skills.

> CRLF was used verily heavily and thus got baked into a lot of different places.

Well, exactly. Which is precisely why it's bullshit to claim that HTTP was "based on teletypes". It was based on technical standards at the time, that originally derived from teletypes, but there was no consideration of teletypes in the development of HTTP that I'm aware of:

> Many early web browsers were expected to be teletype machines [0].

Could you quote a relevant part of your reference? Because I don't see it. Perhaps you're confusing "dumb terminal" with "teletype"? Or confusing the Unix concept of tty, a teletype abstraction, with the electromechanical device known as a teletype - the "remote typewriters" mentioned in the original comment?

By the time that WWW spec was written in 1990, teletypes were decades out of date and not commonly used at all. PCs had existed for over a decade, and video display terminals for mainframes and minicomputers had been around for nearly three decades. No-one was using actual teletypes any more.

> So while it might be a bit of a stretch, I'd say this is far from "complete bullshit".

This conclusion would work if any of your claims had survived scrutiny.

[tripa]

Kind of.

Which part of it do you think is wrong?

[antonvs]

HTTP is not “based on teletypes”. That’s just nerd hyperbole for a technical choice they don’t like, for irrational reasons.