> > IMHO its standard that unknown URL parameters are simply ignored. I > think we should not change this principle. > It's usually the right thing to do to be open to future backward-compatible changes, but I don't know of any such standard, as it equally makes future non-backward-compatible changes impossible. Whatever will be defined in the BIP is the standard in this case. > > (For example, if something that restricts the validity, such > > as "expires" is added later on, it is pretty important not to ignore it. > > Older clients should refuse to comply.) > > In this case, you'd need to refuse *all* parameters you don't know > about. In consequence, all extensions would break older clients. > Which is exactly what I want to avoid by defining this up-front. A versioning scheme can avoid this. Any BIP that breaks backwards compatibility (for example, adds a multiple-send type or specific restriction) should increase the version number. A client rejects URLs with a version number higher than what it knows about. That's the simplest way to handle it, and enough IMO. Wladimir