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Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

sr.ht

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Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#21

Post by x3blah »

known servers: https://portal.mozz.us/gemini/gemini.circumlunar.space/serve...

spec: https://portal.mozz.us/gemini/gemini.circumlunar.space/docs/...

docs: https://portal.mozz.us/gemini/gemini.circumlunar.space/docs/

software: https://portal.mozz.us/gemini/gemini.circumlunar.space/softw...

test ur gemini client: https://portal.mozz.us/gemini/gemini.conman.org/test/torture...

using the protocol ...

known servers

   printf 'gemini://gemini.circumlunar.space/servers/\r\n' |openssl s_client -connect gemini.circumlunar.space:1965 -ign_eof
spec

   printf 'gemini.circumlunar.space/spec/spec-spec.txt\r\n'|socat - ssl:gemini.circumlunar.space:1965
docs

   echo -e '/docs\r\n' |socat - ssl:gemini.circumlunar.space:1965
software

   echo -e '/software\r\n'|socat - ssl:gemini.circumlunar.space:1965
protocol allows for virtual hosting but does not (need to) use sni

   printf '/software/\r\n' |openssl s_client -connect 168.235.111.58:1965  -servername gemini.circumlunar.space -ign_eof

   printf 'gemini://gemini.circumlunar.space/software/\r\n' |openssl s_client -connect 168.235.111.58:1965 -ign_eof

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#22

Post by kick »

RodgerTheGreat wrote: post #18
kick wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BearSSL is pretty tiny, though I haven't looked at it beyond a glance at the homepage after a friend linked it. Is it what you had in mind? https://bearssl.org/

Could be promising. I'll do some reading. Thanks, kick!

Always happy to share what I know!

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#24

Post by x3blah »

RodgerTheGreat wrote: post #15
badsectoracula wrote: post #14

I've made my own Gopher client[0] some time ago, but TBH after the novelty of making it, eventually i abandoned it because i couldn't find anything interesting in there. The most interesting stuff were either gateways from the web or blogs which also had a web version. On the other hand it was fun making it with how ridiculously simple the Gopher protocol is. Sadly it seems that "Gemini" requires TLS that kills that…

Gemini allows clients to function without TLS, but it limits their access/functionality. I'd be very interested in seeing an attempt at a minimal, portable standalone implementation of TLS suitable for Gemini's needs.

Protocol mandates use of nothing less than TLS v1.2 so one could skip/remove all support for lesser versions.

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#25

Post by moonchild »

badsectoracula wrote: post #14

I've made my own Gopher client[0] some time ago, but TBH after the novelty of making it, eventually i abandoned it because i couldn't find anything interesting in there. The most interesting stuff were either gateways from the web or blogs which also had a web version. On the other hand it was fun making it with how ridiculously simple the Gopher protocol is. Sadly it seems that "Gemini" requires TLS that kills that…

TCP and IP are not exactly trivial, though certainly much simpler than TLS. There's no shame in using a library for TLS, either.

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#26

Post by treve »

kick wrote: post #7
apatters wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was delighted when I saw that Gemini is maintained by someone on SDF (named Solderpunk, never heard of him before). This seems as good a time as any to plug https://sdf.org , a great little community which has the feel of a 90s BBS that never went offline.

The site isn't at www.sdf.org for the record, it's just at sdf.org. There's a big difference in what you'll find!

I'm getting redirected from www.sdf.org to sdf.org, but now I'm curious.

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#27

Post by kick »

treve wrote: post #26
kick wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The site isn't at www.sdf.org for the record, it's just at sdf.org. There's a big difference in what you'll find!

I'm getting redirected from www.sdf.org to sdf.org, but now I'm curious.

Try this, which should bring you to MetaArray stuff:

https://www.sdf.org/

(It's what was originally linked to.)

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#28

Post by badsectoracula »

moonchild wrote: post #25
badsectoracula wrote: post #14

I've made my own Gopher client[0] some time ago, but TBH after the novelty of making it, eventually i abandoned it because i couldn't find anything interesting in there. The most interesting stuff were either gateways from the web or blogs which also had a web version. On the other hand it was fun making it with how ridiculously simple the Gopher protocol is. Sadly it seems that "Gemini" requires TLS that kills that…

TCP and IP are not exactly trivial, though certainly much simpler than TLS. There's no shame in using a library for TLS, either.

Sure but a socket interface is available pretty much universally and there is only one API per OS about it to access it, so no worries about breaking libraries or whatever - and really all OSes pretty much use the same API.

TLS on the other hand has multiple implementations and the situation is different per OS. I'm not sure how stable the APIs are either or if you can release -say- a binary that can expect that the API will be there (like you can expect a socket API to be there).

(and besides if for what you're doing you need to implement TCP/IP, requiring TLS is still additional work)

I think Windows does have a stable TLS API, but TBH i'm not sure about macOS (though it isn't like macOS is the bastion of stability) and AFAIK Linux doesn't have anything like that. I guess you could use OpenSSL and assume it to be there.

A library could fix, but it imposes several restrictions you may not want - like the language you'll use (e.g. i might want to use Free Pascal but only C libraries are available) or the compiler version (e.g. i might want to use C89 but only C99 libraries are available).

It is largely philosophical, i'd expect something like a 'tiny web for hackers' to be implementable by one person easily. It might not be practical but then again, the practical perspective is to just stick with the web.

Re: Castor: A browser for the small internet (Gemini, Gopher, Finger)

#29

Post by treve »

In case people want to build this on Ubuntu, I needed the following

   apt install build-essential rustc cargo libgtk-3-dev libgdk-pixbuf2.0-dev libssl-dev
Gemini sites load so fast, it's a little crazy. I played around with Gopher a bit, but mostly through browser add-ons and proxies. A native text-only browser is very fast.
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