System 6 Browser Development Opinions

[equant]

I agree with the no-table-support approach.

Image support, beyond the fact that I've never written code to display images, seems nice, but unembedded would be the way to go. The issue I have with images is there are so many layout images that are just unimportant. It'd be nice if there was a way to isolate the useful images, but there really isn't. There are 103 (non-unique) images used on the page for this thread alone. I thought about having a "image list" dialog that lets you get a list of the unique images, but then they're out of context and I don't know _how_ useful that is. Anyway, I'm happy to stop thinking about image support.

I would imagine that 68kmla phpbb functionality would be version 2.0 to never, but I would like to come up with a test suite or set of sites used as "targets" for development. Off the top of my head I'd like to see it work with Gamba's site and Wikipedia (read only).

Tomlee mentioned wannabee, which I've never used, but his description is what I had in mind for rendering. Using different font sizes and styles within the text, and possibly even small icons.

Well, there's stuff to think about.

 

[porter]

Oh, a couple more, get through those pesky firewalls...

* SOCKS support

* HTTP proxy support

 

[paws]

i honestly think it'd be easier to come up with a new protocol for forums that worked over something like http (maybe just a domain specific markup - use http and cgi, but return something that's not HTML...) and a web frontend a la phpbb and usenet style system 6 client, than writing a system 6 browser that could display a phpbb website with an acceptable degree of accuracy.

 

[equant]

I agree paws. I've actually looked into that exact solution before. It would be very elegant.

 

[Bunsen]

Well, I just looked at this page with page style turned off ... it's not all that different, just a lot plainer and a bit messier. It gives me an idea of what I could perhaps expect from a very basic System 6 browser. Party like it's 1993!

Course I know bugger all about the technicalities, but it was perfectly readable, reasonably tidy, and I'm posting now with styles off. Don't know if that helps the discussion re phpbb at all...

 

[Bunsen]

i honestly think it'd be easier to come up with a new protocol for forums

What about a proxy that turns the pages into html for primitive browsers?

 

[paws]

i honestly think it'd be easier to come up with a new protocol for forums

What about a proxy that turns the pages into html for primitive browsers?

Well, let's say someone wrote a script that returned

(msg (author "bunsen") what about a proxy that turns the pages into html for primitive browsers?)

Than you could do pretty much anything with that... It's a lot easier to generate HTML than it is to parse it...

 

[Bunsen]

I'm in over my head ...

 

[II2II]

I'm assuming that paws is referring to a LISP like notation, which is fairly straight forward to parse since almost anything can be part of a token (except parentheses IIRC).

On the other hand, a structure like the UNIX mbox format may be more appropriate. Particularly if you have the server side do a bit of the work and particularly if you are expecting someone else write the client side software. (mbox is a series of fields, with space for a plain text message. Conceptually, that will be easier for most programmers to understand.)

 

[luddite]

Well, I just looked at this page with page style turned off ... it's not all that different, just a lot plainer and a bit messier. It gives me an idea of what I could perhaps expect from a very basic System 6 browser. Party like it's 1993!

Try looking at it from Lynx... it's fairly horrible, but can be used it you're determined. I think that's a better approximation of a minimal System 6 browser.

 

[tomlee59]

To my tastes, wannabe is a better model to emulate. It does a great job at sensibly rendering pages in pure text mode. If wannabe ran on a 68000, I'd be very happy. [And yes, I've already communicated with the author; he's not inclined to rewrite it for the 68000.]

 

[paws]

I'm assuming that paws is referring to a LISP like notation, which is fairly straight forward to parse since almost anything can be part of a token (except parentheses IIRC).

Yeah, S-Expressions. Dead simple to parse... and read, once you get the hang of it.

On the other hand, a structure like the UNIX mbox format may be more appropriate. Particularly if you have the server side do a bit of the work and particularly if you are expecting someone else write the client side software. (mbox is a series of fields, with space for a plain text message. Conceptually, that will be easier for most programmers to understand.)

It could use XML, it's not really important - except for memory use, where XML would lose like a big pile of shit in a smell nice contest.

I've no clue about hte internals of phpBB, but I think it might even be possible to adapt it? Like, instead of returning HTML, it'd return the data in whatever markup when the client identified itself as 68kMLAsys6client, or something. Keep the database, keep everything - but avoid doing screen scraping.

I don't know PHP and I took a vow a good while back I'd never learn it, but it seems doable.

 

[ealex79]

:b&w:

Isn't the problem with this not the User Interface on the Mac (Text or real graphics) but the lack of a TCP/IP Stack in System 6?

 

[equant]

Isn't the problem with this not the User Interface on the Mac (Text or real graphics) but the lack of a TCP/IP Stack in System 6?

No. MacTCP exists for system 6. There are many internet applications that run on System 6.

 

[II2II]

Try looking at it from Lynx... it's fairly horrible, but can be used it you're determined. I think that's a better approximation of a minimal System 6 browser.

A better approximation, sure. But something as simple as modifying font size and weight can make an almost unreadable page in lynx much more readable. And that is within the capabilities of a System 6 Mac.

I've popped into the forums with elinks from time to time. I've found that with lynx and elinks the biggest problem is the textarea field where we type our messages. One problem is that they often fall across the screen boundary, which makes it hard to review what you've written. This isn't as much of a problem on a 68k Mac because it is easier position the page so that the field is contained by the screen (as long as the browser ensure that the field cannot be larger than the screen).

elinks has another solution to this problem, on that may be viable for any browser: you can pull up a full screen editor for some form fields. Imagine hitting a key and a textedit window (the API, not the program) pops up. Rather than editing in a portal that is meant to fit into a web page, you are now using a proper editor. Since many sites support similar markup for messages, you may even be able to make a WYSIWYGish text editor that automatically dumps the markup into the textarea field when you close the window.

 

[equant]

I was thinking that all forms beyond a single input and a submit button would be replaced with an icon that when clicked would pop up a modal dialog of the form. What do you think of that idea?

 

[luddite]

You know, I think a decent approach might be to write a bare basics text only browser that has room for expansion (maybe via some sort of plug-in deal). I say this for two reasons...

1) If you were to try for tabbed browsing, forms, graphics and flash in v.1 it would probably never get off the ground and

2) A System 6 browser that ends up being a memory hog isn't going to be of much use. I'd suggest that basic functionality on a 1 Meg Plus would be a desirable goal.

Of course I'm probably talking out of my arse here, but I think that support for third-party plug-ins would allow the user to customize the browser within the confines of their Mac's limitations and it might also be a way to get more people working on the project.

 

[luddite]

Isn't the problem with this not the User Interface on the Mac (Text or real graphics) but the lack of a TCP/IP Stack in System 6?

I think the biggest obstacle may be the scarcity of ethernet options for System 6 hardware... it just occurred to me that since I no longer have a dial-up internet account, I have no way of getting any of my compact Macs online (other than dialing in to a shell account, in which case I don't need a browser on the Mac).

That's not intended as an argument against the project, just an observation.

 

[porter]

I think the biggest obstacle may be the scarcity of ethernet options for System 6 hardware.

I have a MacIP solution, which runs on NetBSD and Linux, shouldn't be a problem to get going on Darwin.

So either using AsantePrint or LocalTalk bridge on another mac with both LocalTalk and Ethernet would solve that.

 

[Bunsen]

expansion (maybe via some sort of plug-in deal). / third-party plug-ins would allow the user to customize the browser within the confines of their Mac's limitations and it might also be a way to get more people working on the project.

Sounds a bit like an open-API open source Cyberdog