Repository navigation
http.ServerResponse#sendDate makes overly definitive claim about HTTP standards #42619
Description
Affected URL(s)
https://nodejs.org/docs/latest-v16.x/api/http.html#responsesenddate
Description of the problem
From the docs on this parameter:
This should only be disabled for testing; HTTP requires the Date header in responses.
However, the story seems to be a bit more complicated than that; RFC 7231 has a rather dense paragraph which can be summarized as:
- Server MUST NOT send Date if it doesn't have a suitable clock
- Server MAY send Date for 1xx or 5xx statuses
- Server MUST send Date otherwise (i.e. it has a clock and is sending 2/3/4xx)
This note appears to have been added along with the setting itself in 1e425e3, which doesn't provide any insight on where this claim originated.
I'm not an expert on either Node or HTTP, but it seems like maybe the docs should be updated to something like the below?
This should generally be left enabled; the Date header is mandatory in most cases. (See RFC 7231 for details.)
Activity
wolfgang42 commentedon Apr 6, 2022
I wasn't going to tag @mnot (the author of the linked commit) since he'd probably long forgotten the context on a decade-old patch, but I've just noticed he's also chair of the HTTP WG so probably actually does have context on this question 😀
mnot commentedon Apr 6, 2022
The latest spec (about to be published as an RFC in the next few days) is here. Maybe just link to that when it is published?
marco-ippolito commentedon Jan 20, 2023
@ronag if there is interest to comply with the rfc I can work on it
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate
doc: fix overstated Date header requirement in response.sendDate