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The results should also appear in the terminal, then it will be a real tool, not just a browser-opener.

by niutech 11y ago

nchelluri 11y ago
Ok, so that's exactly what I thought this program did (display results in the terminal), so I downloaded it and installed it. When I found that it opened a web search I was quite surprised and came to look at the comment thread. However, should the results appear in the terminal (i.e. do I agree with you)? I am not at all sure that this browser view is a bad thing. The idea of searching from the command line and focus moving to the browser is just not something I was picturing at all, and I kind of like it. But I definitely do agree 100% that I was and am interested in something that runs these webapps from the command line and makes the terminal a first class interface to say, Google, StackOverflow, etc. I think I may try to tinker with such a thing, and when I thought this project had it, I was really curious to see what method of scraping they used and how they turned web data into meaningful result objects of some sort. Thinking about it, I feel like noting two things: 1 - I don't see why a single application, like s, can't support both interfaces. Give it an alias, say, r, and r renders search results at the command line instead of the browser. No reason the list of providers has to be the same for both interfaces. 2 - now we're on web like 2.9999999, right? Googlebot indexes JS/dynamic webpages properly, and webapps use a lot of JS to perform their basic functions, it seems. i believe it's time to start taking command line browsers seriously again. we have a few production ready off-the-shelf JS engines to choose from today and browsing from terminal seems like a simple and why-the-hell-not idea. Terminal/shell interfaces, imo, provide a really great way to move around, focusing on text and with the super quick functional input response that only keyboard navigation can provide. i am positive that if we started aiming for a web development standard supporting JS and HTML5 or whatever well supported but capable standard is out there today and full accessibility from a text-only/terminal web browser (Lynx for 2015's HTTP realities) then we would be helping out people using non-standard input devices (screen readers, etc.). of course im talking out of my ass here, but someone knowledgeable back me up on this point please. i guess it just didn't completely click until i saw this app, someone else who had the same idea as me (you/your post), and the fact that repo this is useful, but not what i was looking for, that i have decided i feel extremely strongly that now is the time for a fully functional javascript capable cross platform browser that does not render graphics at all and runs happily in the terminal. On another note: the project README has very simple and well highlighted Installation instructions, if you happen to have Golang installed, which I do. but not sure how easy that would be if you didn't. A suggestion to the author: post Windows/Mac/Linux binaries on https://github.com/zquestz/s/releases https://github.com/zquestz/s/releases .
- iodbh 11y ago
  There is this project : http://weboob.org http://weboob.org (Web Outside Of Browsers). It allows the use of certain web apps in the terminal. It's a french project, so it's mostly french apps that have been integrated.

The results should also appear in the terminal, then it will be a real tool, not just a browser-opener.

by niutech 11y ago

The results should also appear in the terminal, then it will be a real tool, not just a browser-opener.

Ok, so that's exactly what I thought this program did (display results in the terminal), so I downloaded it and installed it. When I found that it opened a web search I was quite surprised and came to look at the comment thread. However, should the results appear in the terminal (i.e. do I agree with you)? I am not at all sure that this browser view is a bad thing. The idea of searching from the command line and focus moving to the browser is just not something I was picturing at all, and I kind of like it. But I definitely do agree 100% that I was and am interested in something that runs these webapps from the command line and makes the terminal a first class interface to say, Google, StackOverflow, etc. I think I may try to tinker with such a thing, and when I thought this project had it, I was really curious to see what method of scraping they used and how they turned web data into meaningful result objects of some sort. Thinking about it, I feel like noting two things: 1 - I don't see why a single application, like s, can't support both interfaces. Give it an alias, say, r, and r renders search results at the command line instead of the browser. No reason the list of providers has to be the same for both interfaces. 2 - now we're on web like 2.9999999, right? Googlebot indexes JS/dynamic webpages properly, and webapps use a lot of JS to perform their basic functions, it seems. i believe it's time to start taking command line browsers seriously again. we have a few production ready off-the-shelf JS engines to choose from today and browsing from terminal seems like a simple and why-the-hell-not idea. Terminal/shell interfaces, imo, provide a really great way to move around, focusing on text and with the super quick functional input response that only keyboard navigation can provide. i am positive that if we started aiming for a web development standard supporting JS and HTML5 or whatever well supported but capable standard is out there today and full accessibility from a text-only/terminal web browser (Lynx for 2015's HTTP realities) then we would be helping out people using non-standard input devices (screen readers, etc.). of course im talking out of my ass here, but someone knowledgeable back me up on this point please. i guess it just didn't completely click until i saw this app, someone else who had the same idea as me (you/your post), and the fact that repo this is useful, but not what i was looking for, that i have decided i feel extremely strongly that now is the time for a fully functional javascript capable cross platform browser that does not render graphics at all and runs happily in the terminal. On another note: the project README has very simple and well highlighted Installation instructions, if you happen to have Golang installed, which I do. but not sure how easy that would be if you didn't. A suggestion to the author: post Windows/Mac/Linux binaries on https://github.com/zquestz/s/releases https://github.com/zquestz/s/releases .

iodbh 11y ago
There is this project : http://weboob.org http://weboob.org (Web Outside Of Browsers). It allows the use of certain web apps in the terminal. It's a french project, so it's mostly french apps that have been integrated.