W3C

– DRAFT –
LWS WG Meeting - August 31st, 2026

31 August 2026

Attendees

Present
AZ, eBremer, elf-pavlik, ericP, laurens, pchampin, ryey, TallTed, termontwouter
Regrets
-
Chair
laurens
Scribe
pchampin, laurens

Meeting minutes

Introduction and announcements

laurens: September 7 is labor day in the US, so we decided to cancel the meeting.
… Note that today is a public holiday on the UK, but we seem to have a quorum though.

pchampin: no green light for the charter extension yet, should come soon

Vote: Add subject_identifier_types_supported to AS metadata PR#227

laurens: the meeting recurrence stops after this meeting, but expect it to resume on the same slot from September 14

laurens: this PR extends the authorization server metadat with 2 properties
… subject_token_type_supported specifies which kind of tokens the server supports
… subject_identifier_types_supported has changed names a couple of times, and is about the schemes or other kinds of subject identifiers supported by the server
… did can have different methods, e.g. did:key: or did:web: ; this allows an authorization server to specify which methods they support,
… as well as other URI schemes (e.g. https:)
… we discussed this PR before; any outstanding concerns?

<Zakim> termontwouter, you wanted to ask about reuse

termontwouter: I agree with the need to include this kind of metadata
… but it occurred to me this morning that other approaches exist for that. Why don't we reuse those?

laurens: indeed, other mechanisms exist to advertise subject identifiers types or schemes,
… but I'm not sure they apply here.
… For example, OpenID connect's approach would imply the use of other part of OpenID connect which we do not use.
… Similar concerns apply to GNAP.
… I agree that some parts of the Authorization section are somewhat orthogonal to our specification, see issue w3c/lws-protocol#178 .

<gb> Issue 178 Orthogonality of specifications (by namedgraph)

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to propose merge, new issue and followup pr

elf-pavlik: the issue was open in April, I believe, and we have rough consensus,
… so I suggest we merge this and open an issue to adjust it.

<ericP> +1 to merge this one

elf-pavlik: better than trying to get perfection in the first PR.

termontwouter: I totally agree with this approach.
… But I don't agree that none of the supplied references are usable in our context.
… I think that RFC9493 defines token types.

<elf-pavlik> i'm happy to participate in the followup to identify better reuse

laurens: and we are using it for subject_token_types_supported. This is different from subject_identifier_types_supported

<laurens> PROPOSAL: Merge the PR adding the subject_identifier_types_supported property to the Authorization Server Metadata at w3c/lws-protocol#227

<ericP> +1

<gb> PR 227 Add subject_identifier_types_supported property to AS Metadata (by acoburn) [authorization] [authentication]

<pchampin> +1

<elf-pavlik> +1

<laurens> +1

<termontwouter> 0

<eBremer> +1

<TallTed> +1

RESOLUTION: Merge the PR adding the subject_identifier_types_supported property to the Authorization Server Metadata at w3c/lws-protocol#227

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to ask about changelog in the spec

elf-pavlik: people are already implementing things, so having something is better than nothing

<termontwouter> +1 for listing merged changes

<elf-pavlik> ai written :)

elf-pavlik: understanding that this is workding draft, so subject to change, so having some kind of change log would be useful

pchampin: I might have a solution
… You might be familiar with the history link in the specification documents.
… Another tool like htmldiff could help you create diffs but that is tedious.
… I have set up a user script which actually adds the htmldiff links to the history page for the specification as published by Echidna.
… I will share the user script via Gist for those interested.

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to ask taking advantage of https://www.w3.org/policies/process/#correction-classes

pchampin: my userscript adding diffs in the W3C history: https://gist.github.com/pchampin/5e69dacbc2018398fb6a593140e1d8c7#file-htmldiff_doc_links-user-js

ACTION: laurensdeb to follow up on changelogs for the specification

<gb> Created action #239

Vote: Clarify the ETag requirements and align with RFC 9110 PR#228

laurens: we also discussed this PR a couple of times already
… first the WG wanted to remove ETag requirements completely, but then we agreed that some form of concurrency control was needed as a baseline
… this PR reflects that rough consensus, using ETags as this baseline concurrency control
… there are still a couple of consideration regarding containers that I believe are still insufficiently addressed
… but this can be discussed later; such a baseline is needed to continue the conversation

<Zakim> termontwouter, you wanted to ask for summary of rationale

termontwouter: I don't have strong opinion on whether this should or should not be included,
… but the change of direction seems sudden to me.

laurens: the change did not just happen in the PR itself; the shift of consensus occurrend during a couple of previous meetings
… it was raised that without such a mechanism, interoperability for some use-cases was not assured
… I don't know if others that were on the previous calls want to add something?

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to mention demand for 'deep' last modified in Solid CG

termontwouter: that summary is good enough for me

elf-pavlik: I'm favourable to merge this PR,
… but there seem to be a demand, including from the CG, to be able to keep track of changes of a whole subtree of the container hierarchy

laurens: I'll open an action to record this requirement

<laurens> PROPOSAL: Merge the PR establishing a baseline ETag requirement (MUST) for LWS resource types at w3c/lws-protocol#228

<gb> PR 228 Clarify specific ETag requirements and align with RFC 9110 (by acoburn)

<elf-pavlik> +1

<termontwouter> +1

<pchampin> +1

<laurens> +1

<eBremer> +1

<ericP> +1

RESOLUTION: Merge the PR establishing a baseline ETag requirement (MUST) for LWS resource types at w3c/lws-protocol#228

<TallTed> +1

<ryey> +1

ACTION: @laurensdeb to clarify ETag requirements for Containers (recursively)

<gb> Created action #240

Discussion: Clarify DID support in the SSI-CID authentication suite PR#233

laurens: some context for this PR:
… in PR w3c/lws-protocol#229 we decided to discontinue the authn suite on did:key

<gb> PR 229 Discontinue authn-ssi-did-key (by pchampin)

laurens: because the authn suite on CID can supercede all DIDs (every DID document is also a CID document)
… the consensus was to adjust the CID authn suite to clarify how it also applies to DIDs
… Please review that PR.

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to mention https://www.w3.org/TR/did-resolution/#conformance

elf-pavlik: I suggest to copy over the snippet from the DID:key authn suite into the CID authn suite
… as a non-normative example

laurens: I think we can include it
… It would be good if we could vote on this in our next WG call.

elf-pavlik: see link above to the "DID Resolution" spec, which is updating the terminology on DIDs.
… we need a DID expert to chime in on that spec.
… More generally, we could use CODEOWNERS on the different parts of the spec.

pchampin: I'm staff contact on the DID WG.
… Not a DID expert though.
… Resolution is the process of getting from a DID a DID document.

<termontwouter> That's also my understanding of those terms

Discussion: Add lws:StorageResource to the vocabulary PR#234

elf-pavlik: Dereferencing is getting "something" from a DID URL (which is DID + path, query string, fragment)

eBremer: this is a change of vocabulary about how we call resources
… still a draft PR

Discussion: Moving resources between containers issue#148

laurens: please review, we will bring it up in the agenda of the next WG meeting

laurens: we haved discussed for a while the notion of multiple containment, then decided to drop this from the spec

<laurens> w3c/lws-protocol#237

<gb> PR 237 Define how resources move between containers (by laurensdeb)

laurens: this draft PR saves one feature of the "multi-containment" proposal,
… which is the ability to move a resource from one container to another in one operation (PATCH to the linkset of the resource to be moved)
… by modifying the 'up' relation of the resource
… There are a couple of aspects: the 'up' is server-managed, so a way to advertise the capability to update it is required.
… There might be a better way of advertising it than what is in the PR.
… Other consideration include the impact on totalItems, ETag, and the need to check whether cycles are created
… I'm not sure how we should reflect that in the Security & Privacy Considerations sections, given this is an optional feature.
… Implementers should chose whether this operation is available only on simple resources, or also on containers.
… Most changes are in the 'Storage Capabilities'.
… a 'MetadataUpdate' capability has attributes 'modifiable' (which metadata relation are concerned), 'appliesTo' (all resources, only data resources...)
… 'preservesIdentifier' seems required, but I would like to discuss this with the WG.

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to clarify the need for "server MUST do what it advertises in the related capability"

laurens: See also section ç;- 'Moving resources between containers'

elf-pavlik: thanks for this PR, I was looking forward to them.
… I think we need a clear map between capabilities and normative text.
… If you advertise that, then you MUST do this.

<termontwouter> +1 to explicitly tie capabilities to conformance

elf-pavlik: This goes beyond this PR, that should be a consistent pattern in the spec.

jeswr: possibly a naive question (I have not had time to review it in details);
… for an implementation using slash-semantics, is there a way to specify the URL of the new location?

laurens: the examples show how the server conveys the new up relation;
… I would expect the 'preservedIdentifier' flag to be false for an implementation with slash-semantics,
… but again, I would like to discuss this flag with the group

jeswr: ok, so the server dictates whether the identifier changes or not

<Zakim> termontwouter, you wanted to point out w3c/lws-protocol#238 and agree on preserveIdentifier

jeswr: but how can the client know the new identifier?

laurens: this is a good point, probably a Location header in the response would be needed

<Zakim> elf-pavlik, you wanted to request addressing issue about slashes in examples (by jeswr) before landing this PR

termontwouter: there may be a link between the preservesIdentifier flag and w3c/lws-protocol#238

<gb> Issue 238 Extensibility of metadata categories (by termontwouter)

elf-pavlik: examples based on slash-semantics are confusing; we need to rebase this PR, then fix the examples

laurens: we are at the top of the hour; recall that next week's meeting is cancelled
… we reconvene on September 14 same time, you should see this appear in the W3C calendar soon

Summary of action items

  1. laurensdeb to follow up on changelogs for the specification
  2. @laurensdeb to clarify ETag requirements for Containers (recursively)

Summary of resolutions

  1. Merge the PR adding the subject_identifier_types_supported property to the Authorization Server Metadata at w3c/lws-protocol#227
  2. Merge the PR establishing a baseline ETag requirement (MUST) for LWS resource types at w3c/lws-protocol#228
Minutes manually created (not a transcript), formatted by scribe.perl version 248 (Mon Oct 27 20:04:16 2025 UTC).

Diagnostics

Succeeded: s/converting a DID into/getting from a DID

Succeeded: s/ericP:/eBremer:

Succeeded: s/jeswr/jeswr: possibly a naive question (I have not had time to review it in details);

Succeeded: s/froup/group

Succeeded: s/the new identifier/the new up relation

Maybe present: jeswr

All speakers: eBremer, elf-pavlik, jeswr, laurens, pchampin, termontwouter

Active on IRC: AZ, eBremer, elf-pavlik, ericP, jeswr, laurens, pchampin, ryey, TallTed, termontwouter