Variant object explained

Variant objects in the context of HTTP are objects served by an Origin Content Server in a type of transmitted data variation (i.e. uncompressed, compressed, different languages, etc.).

HTTP/1.1 (1997–1999)^{[1] [2]} introduces Content/Accept headers. These are used in HTTP requests and responses to state which variant the data is presented in.

Example Scenario

Client:GET /encoded_data.html HTTP/1.1Host: www.example.comAccept-Encoding: gzip

Server:HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: http-example-serverContent-Length: 23Content-Encoding: gzip

<23 bytes of gzip compressed data>

See also

• HTTP
• HTTP compression
• List of HTTP headers
• Web cache

External links

• How Apache handles content negotiation

Notes and References

1. Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1. 2068. Fielding. Roy T.. Roy Fielding. Gettys. Jim. Jim Gettys. Mogul. Jeffrey C.. Nielsen. Henrik Frystyk. Henrik Frystyk Nielsen. Berners-Lee. Tim. Tim Berners-Lee. January 1997. IETF. 2009-10-24.
2. Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1. 2616. Fielding. Roy T.. Roy Fielding. Gettys. James. Jim Gettys. Mogul. Jeffrey C.. Nielsen. Henrik Frystyk. Henrik Frystyk Nielsen. Masinter. Larry. Leach. Paul J.. Berners-Lee. Tim. Tim Berners-Lee. June 1999. IETF. 2009-10-24.