5 ms·

Why Gopher lost to HTML

25 points by AndrewWarner 17y ago

rrival 17y ago
TurboGopher VR had such potential.
xal 17y ago
I like the image of Firefox 1.5 on that page. That was my favorite iteration of their UI.
- Legion 17y ago
  That's almost exactly what Firefox 3.5 looks like for me in Linux. No oversized back button or anything like the default Windows theme. I imagine there's probably a classic icon theme that will change the icons to match those old ones.
  - sp332 17y ago
    There are lots of themes at http://addons.mozilla.org http://addons.mozilla.org , they even have a retro category. Foxscape, for example, goes all the way back to Netscape theme. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4083 https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4083
pbhjpbhj 17y ago
I surfed the gopher net and all I got was this lousy URL - gopher://gopher.floodgap.com/1/overbite/ (works in FF + others). "Also, Internet Explorer should NOT be used at ALL! (I'll explain presently).", see gopher://gopher.floodgap.com/0/gopher/wbgopher Edit: first it's poor links2 support, now no linkifying of gopher links, shocking ...
- tvon 17y ago
  Your standard Linux distro probably has the gopher command line client installed. I'm slightly disappointed that its not in OSX.
  - pbhjpbhj 17y ago
    It's not on my Kubuntu and I'd be a bit upset if it was - why include it? Especially as the major browsers have gopher support.
    - tvon 17y ago
      Hmm, it's in my Debian but I might have installed it. Though, browser support is no reason not to include a tiny command-line client.
      - pbhjpbhj 17y ago
        I may have stripped it out. Given the ease with which a client can be installed ("sudo apt-get install ...") then why waste the space. Sure it's small but the principle stands, and many small programs add to lots of space - also that small program is going to be downloaded millions of times unnecessarily, written to CD/DVD, written to HDD or flash drives .. countless transfers and writes, even for a few KB that's a waste.
        tvon 17y ago
        So you'd advocate the removal of ftp because Firefox and Konqueror support it?
        pbhjpbhj 17y ago
        I'm sure the popularity-contest data shows that FTP is used quite a lot. Gopher barely ever. So, "no" unless there were a "command line tools" checkbox on install that could be used to exclude it. I've never actually used the FF ftp (until you mentioned it) and didn't even know it was there - I only occasionally use ftp in a console, usually I'll use Dolphin or Krusader (KDE4).
blasdel 17y ago
I've long maintained that WAP was bitpacked Gopher via Telegram
I_got_fifty 17y ago
How do I get a gopher domain-name?
- pbhjpbhj 17y ago
  You have a standard domain name (as siblings note) and run a gopher server via that name. You'll have to have your own server (or virtual server) as I can't really imagine any hosting company allows gopher servers?!
- tvon 17y ago
  Domain names are not protocol-specific.
  - I_got_fifty 17y ago
    No gopher names? Oh, well... my GopherDaddy! empire probably wouldn't have been very successful anyway..
rsayers 17y ago
The best client to use on a graphical system Firefox with the Overbite extension: http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/d?ff3 http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/d?ff3 For console use Lynx is what I prefer and seems to be popular for that. Shameless Plug: gopher://gopher.robsayers.com
- figital 17y ago
  What's the name of your gopher server software?

25 points by AndrewWarner 17y ago

rrival 17y ago

TurboGopher VR had such potential.

xal 17y ago

I like the image of Firefox 1.5 on that page. That was my favorite iteration of their UI.

Legion 17y ago
That's almost exactly what Firefox 3.5 looks like for me in Linux. No oversized back button or anything like the default Windows theme. I imagine there's probably a classic icon theme that will change the icons to match those old ones.
- sp332 17y ago
  There are lots of themes at http://addons.mozilla.org http://addons.mozilla.org , they even have a retro category. Foxscape, for example, goes all the way back to Netscape theme. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4083 https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4083

pbhjpbhj 17y ago

I surfed the gopher net and all I got was this lousy URL - gopher://gopher.floodgap.com/1/overbite/ (works in FF + others). "Also, Internet Explorer should NOT be used at ALL! (I'll explain presently).", see gopher://gopher.floodgap.com/0/gopher/wbgopher Edit: first it's poor links2 support, now no linkifying of gopher links, shocking ...

tvon 17y ago
Your standard Linux distro probably has the gopher command line client installed. I'm slightly disappointed that its not in OSX.
- pbhjpbhj 17y ago
  It's not on my Kubuntu and I'd be a bit upset if it was - why include it? Especially as the major browsers have gopher support.
  - tvon 17y ago
    Hmm, it's in my Debian but I might have installed it. Though, browser support is no reason not to include a tiny command-line client.
    - pbhjpbhj 17y ago
      I may have stripped it out. Given the ease with which a client can be installed ("sudo apt-get install ...") then why waste the space. Sure it's small but the principle stands, and many small programs add to lots of space - also that small program is going to be downloaded millions of times unnecessarily, written to CD/DVD, written to HDD or flash drives .. countless transfers and writes, even for a few KB that's a waste.
      - tvon 17y ago
        So you'd advocate the removal of ftp because Firefox and Konqueror support it?
        pbhjpbhj 17y ago
        I'm sure the popularity-contest data shows that FTP is used quite a lot. Gopher barely ever. So, "no" unless there were a "command line tools" checkbox on install that could be used to exclude it. I've never actually used the FF ftp (until you mentioned it) and didn't even know it was there - I only occasionally use ftp in a console, usually I'll use Dolphin or Krusader (KDE4).

blasdel 17y ago

I've long maintained that WAP was bitpacked Gopher via Telegram

I_got_fifty 17y ago

How do I get a gopher domain-name?

pbhjpbhj 17y ago
You have a standard domain name (as siblings note) and run a gopher server via that name. You'll have to have your own server (or virtual server) as I can't really imagine any hosting company allows gopher servers?!
tvon 17y ago
Domain names are not protocol-specific.
- I_got_fifty 17y ago
  No gopher names? Oh, well... my GopherDaddy! empire probably wouldn't have been very successful anyway..

rsayers 17y ago

The best client to use on a graphical system Firefox with the Overbite extension: http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/d?ff3 http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/d?ff3 For console use Lynx is what I prefer and seems to be popular for that. Shameless Plug: gopher://gopher.robsayers.com

figital 17y ago
What's the name of your gopher server software?