Edited
** 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
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