Wątek: Gopher:// -- The Internet Underground

Strona: 1 z 1

1 z 8: queenslight

** Reader's Note **

You can jump around this guide by searching for the two plus signs at the start of each section, with updates and expansions noted through out this thread when necessary.

** End Of Reader's Note **

++Ghoper's History

Quoting from Wikipedia:

"Gopher system was released in mid-1991 by Mark P. McCahill, Farhad Anklesaria, Paul Lindner, Daniel Torrey, and Bob Alberti of the University of Minnesota[5] in the United States. Its central goals were, as stated in RFC 1436:
A file-like hierarchical arrangement that would be familiar to users.
A simple syntax.
A system that can be created quickly and inexpensively.
Extending the file system metaphor, such as searches.
Gopher combines document hierarchies with collections of services, including WAIS, the Archie and Veronica search engines, and gateways to other information systems such as File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and Usenet.
The general interest in campus-wide information systems (CWISs) in higher education at the time,[6] and the ease of setup of Gopher servers to create an instant CWIS with links to other sites' online directories and resources were the factors contributing to Gopher's rapid adoption.
The name was coined by Anklesaria as a play on several meanings of the word "gopher".[7] The University of Minnesota mascot is the gopher,[8] a gofer is an assistant who "goes for" things, and a gopher burrows through the ground to reach a desired location.[9]
Decline[edit]
The World Wide Web was in its infancy in 1991, and Gopher services quickly became established. By the late 1990s, Gopher had ceased expanding. Several factors contributed to Gopher's stagnation:
In February 1993, the University of Minnesota announced that it would charge licensing fees for the use of its implementation of the Gopher server.[10][9] Users became concerned that fees might also be charged for independent implementations.[11][12] Gopher expansion stagnated, to the advantage of the World Wide Web, to which CERN disclaimed ownership.[13] In September 2000, the University of Minnesota re-licensed its Gopher software under the GNU General Public License.[14]
Gopher client functionality was quickly duplicated by the early Mosaic web browser, which subsumed its protocol.
Gopher has a more rigid structure than the free-form HTML of the Web. Every Gopher document has a defined format and type, and the typical user navigates through a single server-defined menu system to get to a particular document. This can be quite different from the way a user finds documents on the Web.
Gopher remains in active use by its enthusiasts, and there have been attempts to revive Gopher on modern platforms and mobile devices. One attempt is The Overbite Project,[15] which hosts various browser extensions and modern clients.
In January 2020 Veronica indexed 395 gopher servers,[16] within which it indexed approximately 4.5 million unique selectors."

Find the full Wikipedia article at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_%28protocol%29

++ Getting Started With Gopher

The following web sites will help you in beginning your journey in diving into the underground interwebs.

The Gopher Project:
http://gopherproject.org/
gopher://gopherproject.org

Highway To The Gopher Zone:
http://gopher.zone/


++Gopher Client Applications

For IOS users, grab the "Gopher Client" from
https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/gopher-client/id1235310088

For Android users, grab "DiggieDog" from
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.afewroosloose.gopher&hl=en_US

For clients on other platforms, check out the "Overbite Project":
http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/
gopher://gopher.floodgap.com/1/overbite/

++Gopher Proxies

The FloodGap Gopher Proxy:
http://gopher.floodgap.com/gopher/
(Viewing HTML pages is "NOT" supported do to abuse.)

the Meerkat primitive Gopher proxy:
https://gopherproxy.net/

Gophper, a modern Gopher Proxy Tool:
http://gopher.muffinlabs.com/

Jacob Meulie's Gopher Proxy:
https://gopherproxy.meulie.net/

Prologic -- Gopher Proxy:
https://github.com/prologic/gopherproxy

++ Coming Soon!

A section featuring Links to popular Gopher Spaces
Trenton, the Queen's Light! http://trentonmatthews.com
30.08.2020 03:33

2 z 8: queenslight

For those who wish to visit my Gopher Space (still a "work in progress"), you can find it officialy above ground at
http://trentonmatthews.com
or underground via
gopher://gopher.club/1/users/queenslight/
.

However, if the above links are too long for ya, try one of the links below:

http://fld.gp/1j/pC
gopher://fld.gp/1j/pC

The above shortened URL links, is thanks to the Floodgap Gopher Shortener Service:

gopher://fld.gp/1/gopher/shorten
Trenton, the Queen's Light! http://trentonmatthews.com
30.08.2020 03:46

3 z 8: ArcticMoon

I know you are also a moderator, but I thought we encouragedposters to provide more details. What is this exactly? I wouldn't just click on a random bunch of links.
U3RhbmQgd2l0aCB0aGUgZ3JlYXQgUnVzc2lhIGFuZCBIdW5nYXJ5IQ==
02.09.2020 19:07

4 z 8: thespyde

What it looks like is yet another social platform, maybe similar to Mastodon.
Charles Wells
02.09.2020 21:10

5 z 8: thespyde

Actually, I did a bit of digging and it looks as if it's mainly for document sharing and such. I'm really not sure what this is now.
Charles Wells
02.09.2020 21:57

6 z 8: queenslight

**Guide Update**

Added a section on Gopher's history (which I should probadly have added in the first place), it's there finally.

If you remember GeoCities or GoPlay from back in the day, Gopher spaces are similar to those. Gopher is indeed not a social network and many folks are higly confused at what it is I admit. But yes, it's indeed a thing.

PS. I'll clean up the history section once the server's are back up. I'm surprised that they were up when I was writing all this.


Trenton, the Queen's Light! http://trentonmatthews.com
03.09.2020 00:30

7 z 8: railwayguy

The servers are up again. It took only an hour that they were down.

03.09.2020 01:56

8 z 8: queenslight

Wow, that was, quick!

Trenton, the Queen's Light! http://trentonmatthews.com
03.09.2020 02:58