Another way of looking at this value is to consider TCP/IP ports. If you create an app that needs TCP/IP, there are certain best-practice standards which dictate which ports to avoid because they are considered dedicated to specific tasks (e.g. Port 80=http). Sure, anyone can use these ports for whatever they want, but best practice dictates you shouldn't. However, if you create your own communications protocol, there are plenty of TCP ports that aren't in common use. You can use those as you desire.
I recommend the community take the same approach with service IDs. Let's have a soft-reservation of the bottom 256 and consider anything north of that "free range".
Comments and rebuttals welcomed.
Hi rlh,
Yes!!! You got it!!!
I apologize for the confusion. "qora" called them Service Ids, but I always think of them as Service Ports (as in TCP ports). And I used the terms interchangeably in my sentences.
I believe that in order for Arbitrary Transaction to be effectively and properly utilized, a sets of standards or protocol must be established (just like TCP/IP). For instance, a range of ports should be considered "reserved" for commonly used services, and data formats must be specified for ports that are in used. And I tend to agree with CIYAM on this, perhaps a bigger number like 1024 is better.
Let me give you some examples --
Instead of having one port for a blogging service and another for a messaging service.. Why can't we merge the common functionality into one service port:
Port 10 (Reserved):
Targeted
Message
Service (TMS) - Used for Message/Text that has a targeted audience
Poart 11 (Reserved):
Non-Targeted
Message
Service (NMS) - Used for Message/Text that doesn't have a targeted audience
Port 12 (Reserved):
HTML
Storage
Service (HSS) - Used for Storing Static Web Page
Port 13 (Reserved):
Extended
HTML Storage
Service (EHSS) - USed for storing web page with multiple parts
After we agree on the ports' purposes and the data formats, people will be permitted to use those ports, as long as they follow the rule. What I'm saying is that we need to establish something like TCP/IP protocol for Arbitrary Transaction in order to avoid duplication of services (No wheels needed to be reinvented). In this regard, the transactions can be considered something like "packets" in a data network.
So in the future, instead of setting up a new port and a new data format for a twitter-like service, the developer can simply adapt and utilize the Non-Targeted Message Service Port that was originally designed for a private messaging service.
So before anyone can design and implement anything, we really need to discuss and agree on certain standards. I hope you can see where I can going with this.
Does this make any sense to you??