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Resolving Formal Public Identifiers

This is a pilot service to resolve a Formal Public Identifier (FPI) as used in SGML and return the Public Text represented by it. FPIs are used in the DOCTYPE declarations of SGML files (including HTML and XML) to identify the Document Type Definition (DTD) in a formal manner, for example:

<!doctype HTML public "-//IETF//DTD HTML 3.0//EN">

This is the format defined in ISO 8879 and ISO 9070, and represents (in its most common form: see ISO 8879 productions [79] to [90] [Goldfarb pp.382-390] for the full details):

`-` or `+`	`//`	`IETF`	`//`	`DTD`	`HTML 3.0`	`//`	`EN`	`//`	`(optional)`
Registration Indicator		Owner Prefix		Class	Description		Language/ Designator		Display Version
<-- Owner Identifier -->				<-- Public Text Identifier -->

ISO9070 If you provide public text or FPIs, you should register your company (or yourself) with the ISO 9070 Registrar as a Public Text Owner. Note that registration is for Public Text Owners, not for your Identifiers, not for the text they identify.

Using the server

To use this server, send a standard HTTP request from your browser or other software in one of the following ways, replacing spaces in the FPI with underscores and any ampersands (&) with %26:

either

by typing the URL in the format

http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/PUBLIC?-//IETF//DTD_HTML_3.0//EN

direct into your browser's address or location panel (cut and paste the above to try it);

or

from an embedded link in your HTML or other SGML text, eg

<a href="http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/PUBLIC?fpi">...</a> (HTML) 
<ulink url="http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/PUBLIC?fpi">...</ulink> (DocBook)

where the value of the fpi has been either fully urlencoded or partly encoded by replacing any spaces with underscores and any ampersands (&) with %26

Test using embedded link

or

from an ISINDEX data-collection field, eg in the file header:

<base href="http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/public">

and in the header or text body

<isindex prompt="Formal Public Identifier: ">

or

from an HTML form:

<form method="POST" action="http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/uncgi/public"> 
<p>Formal Public Identifier: <input name="fpi"> 
<input type="SUBMIT" value="Resolve">  
<input type="RESET"></p>
</form>

Users on email-only connections can request resolution by using the WebMail server. Send a request as a 1-line email message saying

get http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/PUBLIC?-//IETF//DTD_HTML_3.0//EN

to the server address: webmail@www.ucc.ie

Resolution

If the FPI is stored on the server, it will be returned as MIME Content-type text/plain.
WARNING: some versions of the Opera and Internet Explorer browsers have a bug which prevents this being passed to a third-party application correctly.
If the FPI is unknown to the server, this script will return a listing of the contents of whatever directory represents the depth of resolution that was possible (ie as much of the FPI as it knows).
The null argument returns this document.
Where information is available, some Public Owners are further identified in their Class directories with their full name and URL, and for some there is also a link to an SGML Declaration for their Public Texts.

A mechanism for submitting more public texts for serving will be added at a later date. Until then, please refer all queries to the Webmaster.