HTTP/1.1 - The Next Generation

The essential simplicity of HTTP was a major factor in its rapid adoption, but this very simplicity became its main drawback; HTTP/1.0 does not sufficiently take into consideration the effects of hierarchical proxies, caching, the need for persistent connections, or virtual hosts. In addition, the proliferation of incompletely-implemented applications calling themselves "HTTP/1.0" has necessitated a protocol version change in order for two communicating applications to determine each other's true capabilities. The HTTP/1.1 (RFC 2616), is a replacement for HTTP/1.0 with much higher performance and adding some extra features needed for use in commercial applications. It's designed to make it easy to implement the basic functionality needed by all browsers, whilst making the addition of more powerful features such as security and authentication much simpler.