I still think Gopher (the protocol that is) is still very relevant today. The beauty of it really is in its simplicity. Great to see that the library I wrote all those years ago is still being used :D
I love the idea of Gopher (even more so of Gemini), but the basic hurdle I run into is content. It feels like half of it is talking about how great gopher/gemini is, and the other half are deeply personal blogs. While the technology reflects the early days of the Internet, the content reflects the early days of blogging and social media (which came later). Rather than talking about things they are passionate about, they are talking about themselves.
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ecliptik
Few months ago I had Claude build me a Gopher browser for Classic Macintosh systems, geomys[1]. I was using TurboGopher[2] before then, and it worked, but had a lot of design choices that are clunky today.
I tried to focus on keeping with the Apple HIG from the 1990s, while also making it more aligned with modern browser principles.
Proud exSDF member from the old days.
SDF was considered 'vintage' back when i joined so must be doubly so now.
Was introduced to Gopher back then too, along with NetBSD.
What a blast from the past to see SDF.org make it to HN in 2026.
Proud grandpa. lol.
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ottoflux
SDF is wonderful. Been supporting them for around 20 years.
I still think Gopher (the protocol that is) is still very relevant today. The beauty of it really is in its simplicity. Great to see that the library I wrote all those years ago is still being used :D
https://pkg.go.dev/git.mills.io/prologic/go-gopher
I love the idea of Gopher (even more so of Gemini), but the basic hurdle I run into is content. It feels like half of it is talking about how great gopher/gemini is, and the other half are deeply personal blogs. While the technology reflects the early days of the Internet, the content reflects the early days of blogging and social media (which came later). Rather than talking about things they are passionate about, they are talking about themselves.
Few months ago I had Claude build me a Gopher browser for Classic Macintosh systems, geomys[1]. I was using TurboGopher[2] before then, and it worked, but had a lot of design choices that are clunky today.
I tried to focus on keeping with the Apple HIG from the 1990s, while also making it more aligned with modern browser principles.
1. https://github.com/ecliptik/geomys
2. https://www.macintoshrepository.org/265-turbogopher
Proud exSDF member from the old days. SDF was considered 'vintage' back when i joined so must be doubly so now. Was introduced to Gopher back then too, along with NetBSD.
What a blast from the past to see SDF.org make it to HN in 2026. Proud grandpa. lol.
SDF is wonderful. Been supporting them for around 20 years.
- https://geminiprotocol.net
- https://reticulum.network
Why ? It is not owned and controlled by billionaires. Plus no AI slop being spammed to gopher sites.
FWIW, the same applies to gemini protocol.
This is a useful angle on Go. I'd want to see how it holds outside the initial conditions.