Re: while we're restricting things ..

[Erik Ostrom <eostrom@research.att.com>]

> I'd also really like to eliminate the null message.  Right now it is
> valid (and specified for cords, even) that `mcp-cord' is a protocol
> with three messages
>   "open"
>   "close"
>   and
>   ""

Not to be tiresome, but the way I read the spec, in fact, mcp-cord is
a protocol composed of three messages

  "mcp-cord-open"
  "mcp-cord-close"
  and
  "mcp-cord"

.  The idea of "null message" is an artifact of an implementation strategy.
(One could talk about a literally null message ("#$# "), but that's already
outlawed by the BNF.)

I'd be amenable to something like the following proposal, which is mostly equivalent:

  Every message belongs to a protocol.  A message name is formed by
  concatenating the name of the protocol it belongs to, a hyphen ("-"),
  and a series of alphanumeric characters.

And the equivalent for cord names.

--Erik