HTTP Alternative Services specification

E242257

HTTP specification IETF standard internet standard document

The HTTP Alternative Services specification is an IETF standard that defines a mechanism for HTTP servers to advertise alternative network endpoints or protocols that clients can use to access the same resources more efficiently or reliably.

Try in SPARQL Jump to: Surface forms Disambiguation Statements Elicitation Referenced by

All labels observed (3)

Label	Occurrences
ALTSVC HTTP/3 frame	1
Alt-Svc HTTP header field	1
HTTP Alternative Services specification canonical	1

How this entity was disambiguated

This entity first appeared as the object of triple T2187942 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.

NED1 Entity disambiguation (via context triple) gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07

Target entity: HTTP Alternative Services specification
Context triple: [HTTP Working Group, responsibleFor, HTTP Alternative Services specification]

A. ALPN (Application-Layer Protocol Negotiation)
ALPN (Application-Layer Protocol Negotiation) is a TLS extension that allows clients and servers to agree on which application-layer protocol (such as HTTP/2 or SPDY) to use over a secure connection during the TLS handshake.
B. HTTP/2
HTTP/2 is a major revision of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol that introduced features like multiplexing, header compression, and server push to significantly improve web performance over HTTP/1.1.
C. RFC 7540
RFC 7540 is the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standard that defines HTTP/2, the major revision of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol designed to improve web performance and efficiency.
D. HTTP/3
HTTP/3 is the third major version of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol, built on the QUIC transport protocol to provide faster, more reliable, and secure web communication.
E. HTTP
HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) is the foundational application-layer protocol used for transmitting web pages and other resources across the World Wide Web.
F. None of above. chosen
G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.

NED2 Entity disambiguation (via description) gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07

Target entity: HTTP Alternative Services specification
Target entity description: The HTTP Alternative Services specification is an IETF standard that defines a mechanism for HTTP servers to advertise alternative network endpoints or protocols that clients can use to access the same resources more efficiently or reliably.

A. ALPN (Application-Layer Protocol Negotiation)
ALPN (Application-Layer Protocol Negotiation) is a TLS extension that allows clients and servers to agree on which application-layer protocol (such as HTTP/2 or SPDY) to use over a secure connection during the TLS handshake.
B. HTTP/2
HTTP/2 is a major revision of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol that introduced features like multiplexing, header compression, and server push to significantly improve web performance over HTTP/1.1.
C. RFC 7540
RFC 7540 is the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standard that defines HTTP/2, the major revision of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol designed to improve web performance and efficiency.
D. HTTP/3
HTTP/3 is the third major version of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol, built on the QUIC transport protocol to provide faster, more reliable, and secure web communication.
E. HTTP
HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) is the foundational application-layer protocol used for transmitting web pages and other resources across the World Wide Web.
F. None of above. chosen

Statements (45)

Predicate	Object
instanceOf	HTTP specification ⓘ IETF standard ⓘ internet standard document ⓘ
addresses	privacy considerations for alternative services discovery ⓘ security considerations for alternative services discovery ⓘ
allows	servers to advertise alternative network endpoints ⓘ servers to advertise alternative protocols ⓘ
appliesTo	HTTP/1.1 ⓘ HTTP/2 ⓘ HTTP/3 ⓘ
audience	CDN and reverse proxy operators ⓘ HTTP client implementers ⓘ HTTP server implementers ⓘ
category	HTTP extension ⓘ transport layer optimization ⓘ web performance ⓘ
defines	ALTSVC HTTP/2 frame ⓘ ALTSVC HTTP/3 frame ⓘ linked to: HTTP Alternative Services specification Alt-Svc HTTP header field ⓘ linked to: HTTP Alternative Services specification ORIGIN HTTP/2 frame ⓘ mechanism for HTTP servers to advertise alternative services ⓘ
goal	enable seamless migration between origins or endpoints ⓘ enable use of more efficient protocols without changing URLs ⓘ improve performance of HTTP connections ⓘ improve reliability of HTTP connections ⓘ
mechanism	Alt-Svc header advertises alternative authority and protocol ⓘ clients cache advertised alternative services for a duration ⓘ clients may opportunistically switch to alternative services ⓘ
publishedBy	IETF HTTP Working Group ⓘ linked to: HTTP Working Group Internet Engineering Task Force ⓘ
relatedTo	HTTP/2 specification ⓘ HTTP/3 specification ⓘ linked to: HTTP/3 TLS-based HTTP deployments ⓘ
scope	does not change HTTP semantics of resources ⓘ does not require changes to resource URLs ⓘ
supports	discovery of HTTP/2 services via HTTP/1.1 ⓘ discovery of HTTP/3 services via HTTP/2 ⓘ failover to backup endpoints ⓘ load balancing across multiple endpoints ⓘ service migration without changing origin hostnames ⓘ
useCase	migrating from HTTP/1.1 to HTTP/2 ⓘ migrating from HTTP/2 to HTTP/3 ⓘ migrating traffic from one data center to another ⓘ serving content from a CDN while preserving origin authority ⓘ testing new protocols with fallback to existing ones ⓘ

How these facts were elicited

Referenced by (3)

Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.

HTTP Working Group → responsibleFor → HTTP Alternative Services specification ⓘ

HTTP Alternative Services specification → defines → Alt-Svc HTTP header field ⓘ

linked to: HTTP Alternative Services specification

HTTP Alternative Services specification → defines → ALTSVC HTTP/3 frame ⓘ