Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) is an addressing technology from which a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is created. Types of URIs include URLs that use the http:// and ftp:// protocols.

The complete URI describes the mechanism used to access the resource, the computer name where the resource is located, and the name of the resource (a file name) on the computer. The letters to the left of the colon indicates the access scheme (protocol). The format of the alphanumeric information to the right of the colon depends on the scheme and contains the host address and the path to the file you want to access. The port number that serves the protocol follows a second colon to the right of the host name. If the port number is not inserted, the access protocol attempts a connection using the default port for the specified protocol. For example, http service uses the default port 80. Therefore, http://hostname:80/filename and http://hostname/filename are valid.

All file based connectors, scripting functions, and object references are supported.

The following URI formats are supported in the Map Editor.

The following formats are also supported:

Do not include brackets [ ] when specifying the URI scheme in Source File/URI (Sources tab) or Target File/URI (Targets tab).

Internet URL structure uses two slashes (//) to the right of the scheme (protocol) and colon. DJObject resource locator structure uses three slashes (///). The scheme determines the number of slashes that follows the colon.

gzip is a special compressed file format that will be automatically decompressed and the contents used within the map.

The following is a valid internet URL format:

where:

The following table provides the description for the URI parameters.

Valid URIs require character strings that are consistent with the established standards. Some URIs may contain reserved (non-valid) characters such as a space or a hash. These non-valid characters must be escaped for the URI to be valid.

Whether a character is reserved or not is defined by the URI component it appears in and the syntax for escaping is dependent on the context. Due to this ambiguous nature, use the reserved or potentially reserved characters with caution. If possible, avoid using these characters. If you cannot avoid it, then it is important to understand the characters that are reserved, the context in which they are reserved, and how to escape the reserved characters. For example, http://server/directory/file 3 changes to http://server/directory/file%20. The space character is replaced with the percent sign and the ASCII hex value 20.

For more information, see Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI) at http://www.ietf.org.

Some URI groups are reserved for specific purposes such as private networks, where it is not required to expose an individual computer or group of computers directly to the web. The following three groups of addresses are reserved for this:

The non-routable IP addresses are used, network routers within the organization route the traffic with Native Address Translation (NAT) using Dynamic Host Control Protocol (DHCP). Because the non-routable IP groups are not registered in the Internet router and domain name server tables, the local router assigns identifying code to the packet headers it receives from local machines. The local router uses these identifiers to direct traffic from and to local computers. Non-routable addresses provide an additional layer of security.