[7522] in bugtraq
Re: Object tag crashes Internet Explorer 4.0
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Kragen)
Wed Aug 5 11:52:08 1998
Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 17:36:57 -0400
Reply-To: Kragen <kragen@POBOX.COM>
From: Kragen <kragen@POBOX.COM>
X-To: Paul Leach <paulle@MICROSOFT.COM>
To: BUGTRAQ@NETSPACE.ORG
In-Reply-To: <CB6657D3A5E0D111A97700805FFE65875D73AF@red-msg-51.dns.microsoft.com>
On Tue, 4 Aug 1998, Paul Leach wrote:
> The possibility of infinite loops and infinite recursion in HTML has been
> discussed on the lists before. Trying to detect and prevent them is an
> instance of the "Turing machine halting" problem, and it is well known among
> computer scientists to be impossible.
Certainly not. HTML is not Turing-complete. In fact, detecting and
preventing infinite loops and recursion in HTML simply requires
traversing a directed acyclic graph and determining that it is, in
fact, acyclic. This is simple.
Perhaps you're thinking of DHTML. Or perhaps you're thinking of some
kind of evil, twisted web server that serves up the same page under an
infinite number of different names, each modified to include a frame
reference to that page under a different name.
Kragen
