Chapter 8: Information servers (1 of 4) -- GOPHER
Chapter 8: Information servers (1 of 4) -- GOPHER
Many public-access sites now have gophers online. To use one, type
gopher
at the command line and hit enter. If you know your site does not have
a gopher, or if nothing happens when you type that, telnet to
consultant.micro.umn.edu
At the log-in prompt , type
gopher
and hit enter. You'll be asked what type of terminal emulation you're
using, after which you'll see something like this:
Internet Gopher Information Client v1.03
Root gopher server: gopher.micro.umn.edu
--> 1. Information About Gopher/
2. Computer Information/
3. Discussion Groups/
4. Fun & Games/
5. Internet file server (ftp) sites/
6. Libraries/
7. News/
8. Other Gopher and Information Servers/
9. Phone Books/
10. Search lots of places at the U of M <?>
11. University of Minnesota Campus Information/
Press ? for Help, q to Quit, u to go up a menu Page: 1/1
Gophers are great for exploring. Just keep making choices to see
what pops up. Play with it; see where it takes you. Some choices will
be documents. When you read one of these and either come to the end or
hit a lower-case q to quit reading it, you'll be given the choice of
saving a copy to your home directory or e-mailing it to yourself. Other
choices are simple databases that let you enter a word to look for in a
particular database.
Notice that one of your choices is "Internet file server (ftp)
sites." Choose this, and you'll be connected to a modified archie program
-- an archie with a difference. When you search for a file through a
gopher archie, you'll get a menu of sites that have the file you're
looking for, just as with the old archie. Only now, instead of having to
write down or remember an ftp address and directory, all you have to do
is position the cursor next to one of the numbers in the menu and hit
enter. You'll be connected to the ftp site, from which you can then
choose the file you want, again just by making a choice in a menu.
You'll be asked for a name in your home directory to use for the
file, after which the file will be copied to your home system.
Unfortunately, this file-transfer process does not yet work with all
public-access sites for computer programs and compressed files. If it
doesn't work with yours, you'll have to get the file the old-fashioned
way, via ftp .
The letter u is an important one to remember while navigating a
gopher -- it moves you back up a gopher directory tree, much like cd ..
on an ftp site.
In addition to ftp sites, there are now scores of databases and
libraries around the world accessible through gophers. There is not yet
a common gopher interface for library catalogs, so be prepared to follow
the online directions more closely when you use gopher to connect to one.
Some gopher menu choices will end with a <?>. This means that if
you select it, you'll be starting up a simple database that can search
through the given service by keyword.
So many services are now available through gophers, that finding
what you want has become difficult. Fortunately, you can use veronica, a
laboriously constructed acronym that does for "gopherspace" what archie
(there is no betty, yet) did for files. You'll usually find veronicas
(there are now several) under "Other gopher and information services."
When you call up a veronica, tell her (it?) the keyword or words you're
interested in, and she/it will search all available databases for it.
For example, say you want to impress company tonight and make cherries
flambe. If you were to type in "flambe" after calling up veronica, you
would soon get a menu listing several flambe recipes, including one
called "dessert flambe." Put your cursor on that line of the menu and
hit enter, and you'll find it's a menu for cherries flambe. Then hit
your q key to quit, and gopher will ask you if you want to save the file
in your home directory on your public-access site or whether you want to
e-mail it somewhere.