#protocol
MinusBrowser 2.7 is Published
Minus is an alternative to, but not a replacement for, HTTP and Gopher.
The following changes were made.
- If I2P is running, MinusBrowser can now read files from
.i2pdomains using HTTP or HTTPS. - A new "Add file" button has been added to the server window. This adds files to your library that already exist.
- Error checking in the functions that add files to your library has been improved.
To update to this new version, if you already have MinusBrowser 2.1 or later, just follow the instructions on your browser’s home page. You will not need to use a web browser to update.
To get MinusBrowser if you do not already have it, download this file from Codeberg.
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
There is no need to install MinusBrowser. Just download the .tar.gz file to your home folder and unpack it with
tar -xzf MinusBrowser.tar.gz
or use your favorite GUI software to unpack it. If you have a version of MinusBrowser earlier than 2.1, unpack the .tar.gz file into the same directory as your present MinusBrowser folder.
To follow the progress of the Minus Protocol Project, click on #minus-protocol or look at https://nerdpol.ch/tags/minus-protocol
You can download MinusBrowser from a terminal window with this command. This will work only if Tor Browser is running because it borrows Tor Browser’s SOCKS5 proxy. (Both Tor Browser and MinusBrowser contain their own copy of Tor.)
curl --socks5-hostname 127.0.0.1:9150 -O gopher://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion:1990/9/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
This works because all Minus URLs can be translated into Gopher URLs.
minus://something.onion/ → gopher://something.onion:1990/9/
For more information:
minus://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion/
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol
#internet #protocol #tcp #hypertext #http #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #browser #minusbrowser #minus-browser #server #minus-server
MinusBrowser 2.6 is Published
Minus is an alternative to, but not a replacement for, HTTP and Gopher.
- You can now edit a page by holding down the Control key while you click a
file://link to it. - You can now remove a page from your library by holding down the Control key while you right-click a
file://link to it. - Your initial
index.minusfile is created immediately after clicking theStart Serverbutton the first time. This fixes a bug in previous versions. - The server now checks the file name extension of the file name you enter after you click the
New pagebutton to make sure it is.minus,.txt,.text, or.asc. This fixes a bug in previous versions.
To update to this new version, if you already have MinusBrowser 2.1 or later, just follow the instructions on your browser’s home page. You will not need to use a web browser to update.
To get MinusBrowser if you do not already have it, download this file from Codeberg.
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
There is no need to install MinusBrowser. Just download the .tar.gz file to your home folder and unpack it with
tar -xzf MinusBrowser.tar.gz
or use your favorite GUI software to unpack it. If you have a version of MinusBrowser earlier than 2.1, unpack the .tar.gz file into the same directory as your present MinusBrowser folder.
To follow the progress of the Minus Protocol Project, click on #minus-protocol or look at https://nerdpol.ch/tags/minus-protocol
You can download MinusBrowser from a terminal window with this command. This will work only if Tor Browser is running because it borrows Tor Browser’s SOCKS5 proxy. (Both Tor Browser and MinusBrowser contain their own copy of Tor.)
curl --socks5-hostname 127.0.0.1:9150 -O gopher://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion:1990/9/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
This works because all Minus URLs can be translated into Gopher URLs.
minus://something.onion/ → gopher://something.onion:1990/9/
For more information:
minus://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion/
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol
#internet #protocol #tcp #hypertext #http #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #browser #minusbrowser #minus-browser #server #minus-server
MinusBrowser 2.5.2 is Published
Minus is an alternative to, but not a replacement for, HTTP and Gopher.
- When using Tails, MinusBrowser now correctly determines whether the computer is connected to a network.
- New Gopher links have been added to the "Known Minus Libraries and Selected Gopher Holes" page.
- MinusBrowser now, finally, correctly finds text with hyphens (-).
- MinusBrowser now tolerates spaces in URLs. Spaces are not allowed in
minus://URLs, but they are allowed infile://,gopher://,http://, andhttps://URLs.
To update to this new version, if you already have MinusBrowser 2.1 or later, just follow the instructions on your browser’s home page. You will not need to use a web browser to update.
To get MinusBrowser if you do not already have it, download this file from Codeberg.
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
There is no need to install MinusBrowser. Just download the .tar.gz file to your home folder and unpack it with
tar -xzf MinusBrowser.tar.gz
or use your favorite GUI software to unpack it. If you have a version of MinusBrowser earlier than 2.1, unpack the .tar.gz file into the same directory as your present MinusBrowser folder.
To follow the progress of the Minus Protocol Project, click on #minus-protocol or look at https://nerdpol.ch/tags/minus-protocol
You can download MinusBrowser from a terminal window with this command. This will work only if Tor Browser is running because it borrows Tor Browser’s SOCKS5 proxy. (Both Tor Browser and MinusBrowser contain their own copy of Tor.)
curl --socks5-hostname 127.0.0.1:9150 -O gopher://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion:1990/9/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
This works because all Minus URLs can be translated into Gopher URLs.
minus://something.onion/ → gopher://something.onion:1990/9/
For more information:
minus://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion/
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol
#internet #protocol #tcp #hypertext #http #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #browser #minusbrowser #minus-browser #server #minus-server
#Tumblr and #Flickr Might Join #Mastodon’s “Fediverse” #Network
source: https://www.howtogeek.com/850954/tumblr-and-flickr-might-join-mastodons-fediverse-network/
Matt #Mullenweg, CEO of #Automattic — the current owner of the #social #media platform Tumblr — confirmed that Tumblr will soon support the ActivityPub #protocol. He said in a #Twitter post, “we’ll add #activitypub for interconnect. We are mostly dealing with the waves of new users right now and keeping everything scaling but [interoperability] and activitypub are ASAP.”
...
Meanwhile, the photo sharing site Flickr is considering ActivityPub support. CEO Don #MacAskill said on Twitter, “Was just discussing ActivityPub earlier this week internally. Should we add to Flickr? No promises, just thinking out loud to gauge interest. It might be right up our alley, though.”
#ElonMusk's #Twitter to Add #OpenSource #Signal #Protocol for #Encrypted DMs
source: https://news.itsfoss.com/twitter-signal/
In other words, Elon confirmed that encrypted DMs are coming soon.
MinusBrowser 1.2 is Published
Minus is an alternative to, but not a replacement for, HTTP and Gemini.
- Tor now starts automatically. The option to keep Tor running after the browser window is closed still exists.
- Tor is now used for all connections, not just connections to
.oniondomains. - Gopher is now supported, but not as fully as with a dedicated Gopher client. Gopher menus are presented as if they were Minus pages. You can click on Gopher links just as you do with Minus links. Search is also supported.
- Various annoying bugs are fixed. This includes bugs related to selected text.
The new version is available on Codeberg as a .tar.gz file.
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
There is no need to install MinusBrowser. Just download the .tar.gz file to your home folder and unpack it with
tar -xf MinusBrowser.tar.gz
or use your favorite GUI software to unpack it.
If you have an earlier version, unpack the .tar.gz file into the same directory as your present MinusBrowser folder. I plan to make future versions of MinusBrowser able to update themselves similarly to the way EasyGPG updates itself.
To follow the progress of the Minus Protocol Project, click on #minus-protocol or look at https://nerdpol.ch/tags/minus-protocol
#internet #protocol #tcp #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #browser #minusbrowser #minus-browser
MinusBrowser 1.0 is Published
MinusBrowser is a browser for the Minus protocol written in Tcl/Tk that also requires curl.
The Software
I have developed a Minus server and a Minus browser for Linux distros. I am putting the Minus browser on Codeberg first. I will put a server there later.
My browser is written in Tcl/Tk, and it also requires curl. Like the Tor Browser, MinusBrowser includes its own copy of Tor. The protocol specification allows for the use of TLS, but MinusBrowser does not support it -- at least, not yet. My present Minus servers run as Tor Onion Services, and I have no plan to create clearnet servers in the future. However, MinusBrowser will also read from libraries on local networks.
There is no need to install the browser. Just download the .tar.gz archive and unpack it. The ReadMeFirst.txt file explains how to launch it on various distros.
MinusBrowser includes a list of known public Minus libraries. So far, I know of only my two libraries: the one for this project and the one for my EasyGPG project.
The Files
MinusBrowser
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/MinusBrowser.tar.gz
Minus Protocol Specification
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol/raw/branch/main/minus-specification.md
What is Minus?
The Minus protocol is an alternative to Gopher, HTTP, and Gemini. It was inspired by Gopher. Gopher Plus was intended to add features to Gopher, but I wanted to subtract features. I wanted a Gopher Minus. I shortened this to Minus.
Minus is Gopher with only type 9 files. (This will make sense to you if you have ever implemented a Gopher server or client.)
As with Gopher and Gemini, a Minus client sends only one line of text that specifies the file to download. The server then sends back the requested file or a message in UTF-8 text explaining why the file was not sent. Notice that there is nothing at all like request and response headers.
The files served can be of any type, but only .minus, .txt, .text, and .asc files will be displayed by the client. Other types are saved to mass storage.
Minus files are UTF-8 text. There is no markup language apart from using # characters to indicate headers, and the back-tick (`) to delimit code snippets and similar text. Every character in the file is shown to the user.
The only hypertext feature is that all minus:// URLs, alone on a line, are automatically clickable links.
Minus defines its own MIME type, like HTTP's text/html. This is text/minus, and the file name suffix is .minus.
Minus URLs are of the form minus://domain.tld/something.minus. There is no optional authority component, nor are there any optional query or fragment components. The browser sends the part of the URL after the TLD to the server to specify the desired file.
The Minus equivalent of the HTTP web site and Gopher gopher hole is the Minus library.
The Future of this Project
As mentioned above, I will put my Minus server on Codeberg. I want to build a GUI for it soon, but I will probably upload it before that is finished.
I am thinking about several improvements to the browser. One is to enable the MinusBrowser to read pages aloud. This would be done by recording sound files with espeak and playing them with VLC or Audacious. I am also thinking about limited support for Gopher. This would translate Gopher menus into Minus pages and allow display of files that appear in Gopher menus as type 0. I definitely plan to make MinusBrowser able to update itself using Codeberg or using the Minus Library for this project.
I am also thinking about using gpg to display PGP messages and verify their signatures. This would require that the browser also import PGP keys.
Minus Protocol Project on Codeberg
https://codeberg.org/giXzkGsc/Minus-Protocol
Minus library for the Minus protocol project
minus://mvxpelpxu2f7kzotb2s2t6fkmggvrd7qdg2wjs6waiyf2nbhkawux4yd.onion/
Minus library for EasyGPG
minus://7hinc6ucgvwbcjjoe44lhzzxyjptb3da6tzl33oe7ezl2qgwlrkfe6yd.onion/
#internet #protocol #tcp #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #browser #minusbrowser #minus-browser
Latest Version 2022-07-05
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the specified file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The client may close the TCP connection before the entire file is received. The server must tolerate this.
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_/."
The specifier may be just /, but, otherwise, it should not end with /. The specifier should also not contain //, .., ./, or /..
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Avoiding Information Exfiltration
Exfiltration of information from the client is prevented by only allowing the transaction above, but indirectly exfiltrating information from the server is still possible.
This could happen if all the files served are kept in one directory, and the specifier is combined with the path name of this one directory to form the path name of the file served. This is obviously insecure, yet many file servers are designed this way. Such servers have to use various strategies to mitigate the insecurity created by this design.
A better design uses an index that contains an entry for each file that can be served. Each entry relates a specifier to the path name of the file it specifies. With this design, only files listed in the index can be served, and the specifier need not contain any part of the path name of the file.
Transport Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
The client should recognize Minus URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage. The file names of files saved to mass storage will be the part of the specifier after the last /. Clients should check that the downloaded file is not actually an error message sent by the server instead of the specified file.
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there are very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information onto the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
This adds a note about error messages suggested by @prplcdclnw@diasp.eu , and a note about / in specifiers.
Third Release Version
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the requested file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_/."
The specifier may be just /, but, otherwise, it should not end with /. The specifier should also not contain //.
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Avoiding Information Exfiltration
Exfiltration of information from the client is prevented by only allowing the transaction above, but indirectly exfiltrating information from the server is still possible.
This could happen if all the files served are kept in one directory, and the specifier is combined with the path name of this one directory to form the path name of the file served. This is obviously insecure, yet many file servers are designed this way. Such servers have to use various strategies to mitigate the insecurity created by this design.
A better design uses an index that contains entries for each file that can be served. Each entry relates a specifier to the path name of the file it specifies. With this design, only files listed in the index can be served, and the specifier need not contain any part of the path name of the file.
Transport Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
The client should recognize Minus URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage. The file names of files saved to mass storage will be the part of the specifier after the last /. Clients should check that the downloaded file is not actually an error message sent by the server instead of the specified file.
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there are very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTP 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information on the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
This document is 1157 words long. The official Gopher specification is 5395 words long. The official HTTP 1.1 specification is 61904 words long.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
How to run your Minus server as a Tor Onion Service
- Create a new, empty folder called
onion-service. - Find your Tor Browser folder. If you have no Tor Browser folder, download https://www.torproject.org/dist/torbrowser/11.0.14/tor-browser-linux64-11.0.14_en-US.tar.xz and then unpack it. Locate the folder you just created.
- Inside the Tor Browser folder is a folder called
Browser. Inside theBrowserfolder is a folder calledTorBrowser. Inside theTorBrowserfolder is a folder calledTor. Copy (do not move, but copy) theTorfolder to your newonion-servicefolder. - Save the two scripts below to the
onion-servicefolder, and mark them executable withchmodor your graphical file manager. - Run
start-service.sh. New folders and files will be created in youronion-servicefolder. The new file calledhostnamecontains the name of your new Tor Onion Service. This will be a domain name that ends with.onion. My domain name is7hinc6ucgvwbcjjoe44lhzzxyjptb3da6tzl33oe7ezl2qgwlrkfe6yd.onionso the URL of my Minus server isminus://7hinc6ucgvwbcjjoe44lhzzxyjptb3da6tzl33oe7ezl2qgwlrkfe6yd.onion/. Apart from reading thehostnamefile, you should leave these newly-created files and folders alone.
Here are the two scripts mentioned in number 4 above.
start-service.sh
````
#!/bin/sh
thisfile=readlink -e "${0}"
thisdir=dirname "${thisfile}"
chmod 700 "${thisdir}" # If this is not the permission, Tor will not run.
"${thisdir}/stop-service.sh"
printf "%s\n%s\n%s\n%s\n%s\n%s\n%s\n" "SocksPort 0" "RunAsDaemon 1" "AvoidDiskWrites 1" "DataDirectory ${thisdir}" "HiddenServiceDir ${thisdir}" "PidFile ${thisdir}/tor.pid" "HiddenServicePort 1990 127.0.0.1:1990" > "${thisdir}/torrc"
chmod 600 "${thisdir}/torrc"
env LD_LIBRARY_PATH="${thisdir}/Tor" "${thisdir}/Tor/tor" -f "${thisdir}/torrc" # start Tor
exit 0
````
stop-service.sh
````
#!/bin/sh
thisfile=readlink -e "${0}"
thisdir=dirname "${thisfile}"
if test -f "${thisdir}/tor.pid"
then
theID=cat "${thisdir}/tor.pid"
if ps ${theID} | grep "${thisdir}/Tor/tor" > /dev/null
then
kill ${theID}
fi
rm -f "${thisdir}/tor.pid"
fi
exit 0
````
Please tell me about your new Minus servers. I want to keep and publish a list of all known public Minus servers and publish it on my Minus server.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #minus #minus-protocol #tor #onion-service #minus-server
Small but complete Minus server
implemented as a BASH script
This fully complies with the Minus Protocol Specification.
Save this as mserver and mark it executable with chmod or your GUI file manager. This requires mini-inetd, which you will probably find in a package called Tcputils. This package also includes tcpconnect which is mentioned below.
Start mserver with mserver start and stop it with mserver stop.
You are encouraged to edit the values of indexfile and requestlog. If you do not, a new directory will be created in ${HOME} called minus-contents. You can edit your index file and your pages with an ordinary text editor.
To experiment with your new server (before you start serving it as a Tor Onion Service) you can use tcpconnect. printf "" | tcpconnect -r -v 127.0.0.1 1990 will get your index.minus page. This is like the index.html page in HTTP. It should contain the URLs of your other pages and files.
The printf command sends the specifier to the server. In the example above, a zero-length specifier is sent, so, in accordance with the Minus specification, the specifier defaults to index.minus.
Please read the comments in mserver. Comments to this post are welcome.
#!/bin/bash
# mserver 1.0
# Copyright (C) 2022 the author indicated below
# The author of mserver made an OpenPGP,
# RSA key pair. The fingerprint of this key pair is
# BA34F30AC917CB0714884A3DA6BDBF5757B731E9
# mserver is distributed under the terms of the GNU General
# Public License, version 3 (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html).
# mserver is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY--without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
# GNU General Public License for more details.
# Only the path name in indexfile determines the file served. No part of user input is used as
# part of the path name of the file. This is much more secure than determining the path name directly from
# user input. A file can not be served simply because it is in a certain directory. Only listing the file in
# indexfile makes it available. Specifiers need not contain any part of the path names of the files they
# specify.
# Each line of indexfile is
# <specifier>|<path name of file>
# specifier may not contain any characters except "0123456789abcdefghijklmonpqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ.-/_"
# because all other characters are removed from theinput.
# Path names that do not begin with / are relative to the directory of indexfile.
thisfile="$(readlink -e "${0}")"
if test "${1}" = "start"
then
if test -z "$(ps -o args -C mini-inetd | grep -F "${thisfile}")"
then
mini-inetd 127.0.0.1:1990 "${thisfile}" & # start serving
fi
exit 0
elif test "${1}" = "stop"
then
theID="$(ps -o pid,args -C mini-inetd | grep -F "${thisfile}" | sed "s/^[ \t]*//" | grep -o "^[0-9]*")"
if test -n "${theID}"
then
kill ${theID} # stop serving
fi
exit 0
fi
# mini-inetd listens for tcp connections on port 1990.
# For each connection, this file is started with standard input and standard output connected to the socket.
# When this file exits, the tcp connection is closed.
if test "$(ps -o args -C "$(basename "${thisfile}")" | grep -cF "${thisfile}")" -gt 12 # mitigate DoS attacks
then
exit 0
fi
read -t 30 -n 255 theinput # Read 1 line, but no more than 255 bytes. Timeout after 30 seconds to mitigate DoS attacks.
theinput="$(printf "%s" "${theinput}" | tr -dc "0-9A-Za-z\.\-/_" | sed "s/^\///")" # remove anything not allowed and initial /
# set indexfile and requestlog to desired values
indexfile="${HOME}/minus-contents/minus.index"
requestlog="/dev/null" # this can be /dev/null to prevent logging
indexdir="$(dirname "${indexfile}")"
if ! test -f "${indexfile}" # no index file
then
mkdir -p "${indexdir}"
printf "%s\n%s" "index.minus|index.minus" "other.minus|other.minus" > "${indexfile}"
printf "%s\n" "This is the home or index page." > "${indexdir}/index.minus"
printf "%s\n" "This is the other page." > "${indexdir}/other.minus"
fi
cd "${indexdir}"
if test -z "${theinput}" # if no input, default to index.minus
then
theinput="index.minus" # This is the home or index page. It should have links to the other pages.
fi
if test -n "$(grep -m 1 -o "^${theinput}|" "${indexfile}" | grep -F "${theinput}|")" # necessary because theinput may contain .
then
thefile="$(grep -m 1 "^${theinput}|" "${indexfile}" | sed "s/^[^|]*|//")" # use indexfile to find path name of the file
else
thefile=""
fi
if test -n "${thefile}"
then
cat "${thefile}" # return the file
printf "%s sent %s\n" "$(date "+%Y-%m-%d %I:%M:%S %p")" "${theinput}" >> "${requestlog}"
else
printf "\"%s\" does not specify a file that this server will serve.\nTry \"index.minus\".\n" "${theinput}" # return an error
printf "%s miss %s\n" "$(date "+%Y-%m-%d %I:%M:%S %p")" "${theinput}" >> "${requestlog}"
fi
exit 0
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #minus #minus-protocol
Second Release Version (See the first comment below.)
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the requested file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_/."
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Avoiding Information Exfiltration
Exfiltration of information from the client is prevented by only allowing the transaction above, but indirectly exfiltrating information from the server is still possible.
This could happen if all the files served are kept in one directory, and the specifier is combined with the path name of this one directory to form the path name of the file served. This is obviously insecure, yet many file servers are designed this way. Such servers have to use various strategies to mitigate the insecurity created by this design.
A better design uses an index that contains entries for each file that can be served. Each entry relates a specifier to the path name of the file it specifies. With this design, only files listed in the index can be served, and the specifier need not contain any part of the path name of the file.
Transport Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
The client should recognize Minus URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage. The file names of files saved to mass storage will be the part of the specifier after the last /.
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there are very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTP 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information on the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
This document is 1117 words long. The official Gopher specification is 5395 words long. The official HTTP 1.1 specification is 61904 words long.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
Minus Protocol and EasyGPG 4.55
Work on adding Minus support to EasyGPG is finished. I will wait 24 to 48 hours before I publish EasyGPG 4.55 to be certain that it is ready.
EasyGPG's Read text from the Internet will be the only way to read the EasyGPG Minus server until I (and possibly others) can produce some Minus clients.
Minus is based on Gopher. It is Gopher without the odd type codes and Gopher menus. Gopher menus are not human-readable. A Gopher client is necessary to present these menus in a human-friendly way.
Because Minus is based on Gopher, it is possible to translate Minus URLs into Gopher URLs. While you are waiting on EasyGPG 4.55, you can use EasyGPG 4.54.7 to browse the EasyGPG Minus server.
gopher://7hinc6ucgvwbcjjoe44lhzzxyjptb3da6tzl33oe7ezl2qgwlrkfe6yd.onion:1990/9/
This just replaces minus:// with gopher:// and adds :1990/9 after the TLD of the domain. This is actually the simple way that EasyGPG 4.55 supports Minus.
Of course, you must have Tor to use .onion domains. However, using EasyGPG, it is only necessary to have the Tor Browser running, and curl installed.
In the next few days I want to start development of a very simple Minus client and server that others can use. These will be implemented as BASH scripts. The CLI client will probably not make Minus URLs links, as required by the specification, so it will not yet be a complete client implementation. It will, however, handle Tor in the same user-friendly way that EasyGPG does.
I hope to make the server and client so easy to read and understand that others will produce their own better alternatives. This applies especially to Minus clients.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol #easygpg #gpg #encryption #privacy #surveillance #security #cryptography
First Release Version
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the requested file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_/."
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Avoiding Information Exfiltration
Exfiltration of information from the client is prevented by only allowing the transaction above, but indirectly exfiltrating information from the server is still possible.
This could happen if all the files served are kept in one directory, and the selector is combined with the path name of this one directory to form the path name of the file served. This is obviously insecure, yet many file servers are designed this way. Such servers have to use various strategies to mitigate the insecurity created by this design.
A better design uses an index that contains entries for each file that can be served. Each entry relates a specifier to the path name of the file it specifies. With this design, only files listed in the index can be served, and the specifier need not contain any part of the path name of the file.
Transport Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
The client should recognize Minus URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage. The file names of files saved to mass storage will be the part of the specifier after the last /.
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there are very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTP 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information on the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
This document is 1117 words long. The official Gopher specification is 5395 words long. The official HTTP 1.1 specification is 61904 words long.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
Fifth preliminary draft
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the requested file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_/."
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Avoiding Information Exfiltration
Exfiltration of information from the client is prevented by only allowing the transaction above, but indirectly exfiltrating information from the server is still possible.
This could happen if all the files served are kept in one directory, and the selector is combined with the path name of this one directory to form the path name of the file served. This is obviously insecure, yet many file servers are designed this way. Such servers have to use various strategies to mitigate the insecurity created by this design.
A better design uses an index that contains entries for each file that can be served. Each entry relates a specifier to the path name of the file it specifies. With this design, only files listed in the index can be served, and the specifier need not contain any part of the path name of the file.
Transport Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
Minus URLs must be the only thing on the line they appear in.
The client should recognize URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage. The file names of files saved to mass storage will be the part of the specifier after the last /.
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there are very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTP 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information on the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
This document is 1116 words long. The official Gopher specification is 5395 words long. The official HTTP 1.1 specification is 61904 words long.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
Third preliminary draft
Minus Protocol Specification
The Name of the Minus Protocol
The name Minus was inspired by Gopher Plus. Gopher Plus added features to Gopher; Minus subtracts features from Gopher.
Minus Transactions
Server: listens for TCP connections on port 1990
Client: opens a TCP connection to the server on port 1990
Server: accepts the TCP connection
Client: sends a file specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded
Server: sends the requested file or a UTF-8 text message explaining why the specified file was not sent
Server: closes the TCP connection
The specifier is one line of text which can contain only the characters inside the following quotation marks.
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz 0123456789-_/."
If the specifier is / or zero-length, the specifier will default to index.minus. This is similar to index.html in HTTP.
The error message mentioned above should be UTF-8 text with \n at the end of lines, and not \r\n.
There must be no other communication between the server and client. Notice that no information about the client is sent to the server.
Security
Minus is insecure unless TLS is used or the server is run as a Tor Onion Service. Running as a Tor Onion Service is preferred because it makes everything easier. No registration of a domain name is necessary, no TLS certificate is required, and both server and client are easier to implement without TLS.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Minus URL Format
Here is an example of a Minus URL.
minus://vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion/index.minus
(There is not a server at this domain. This is just an example.)
This has three parts: the protocol (or scheme) minus://, the host (an FQDN or an IP address) vdvfh9y003nvebcctyc67mnpl1fuvfayoh2qzyo9ksyj3m1so5idkyef.onion, and /index.minus (the specifier sent by the client to the server). See the section above for the complete list of characters allowed in a specifier.
Minus URLs in .minus documents should be selectable links that open the specified document. In a GUI client, these should be clickable.
If TLS is used, the scheme in the URL should be minuss:// instead of minus://.
Names of Files
The client must use the specifier that specified the file as its name, even though the file may be saved on the server with a different name. The client will not know what directories and files are on the server, nor how directories there are structured.
The .minus File Type
Files with the .minus filename extension should be UTF-8 text files. The server should not limit the line length of lines in these files (as in Gopher). However, the client should.
Lines in .minus files should end with \n and not \r\n.
The client should recognize URLs in the text of .minus files and make them easily selectable. Selecting them should download the specified file. If the file downloaded is a .minus file, it should be displayed. If it is a .txt, .text, or .asc file, it should also be displayed, but without necessarily making URLs in the text selectable. All other files should be downloaded and saved to mass storage, unless the client is also a browser for other file types (for example, .html).
Minus does not allow for embedding other files in a .minus file such that they are displayed in the same window as the text. No URLs in the text should ever be automatically downloaded.
Display of Text in .minus Files
How the text of .minus files is displayed should be controlled by the client and its user. However, the text of the .minus file may indicate, with markings, what functions parts of the text play in the document.
For example, the text could indicate what lines of the document are headings and subheadings. This could be done by beginning the line with a # or more than one #, followed by a space. The client and its user could decide how headings should be displayed. Similarly, the ` could indicate the beginning and end of a code snippet, and the client could display these snippets differently from the rest of the text.
It is also acceptable for the client not to display marked text or markings differently from the rest of the text.
Minus Compared to Gopher, Gemini, and HTTP
Gemini is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than HTTP, but more complex than Gopher. Minus, on the other hand, is meant to be less complex and easier to implement than all of these others, including Gopher.
This simplicity is essential if the Internet is to, once again, become human-friendly.
HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 are so complex that no single person can implement a server or a client that supports the entire HTTPS 1.1 and HTML5 standards. In fact it requires a large team of people to do so. It is, therefore, not surprising that there very few clients or servers not based on some other client or server.
Because complexity is the enemy of security, this software is also insecure.
Perhaps the worst problem with HTTP 1.1 and HTML5 is the way, by design, that they spy on users of HTTPS 1.1 clients. In Minus, the only information communicated by the client to the server is the specifier that specifies the file to be downloaded. This is very different from HTTPS 1.1. Even worse, HTTPS 1.1 allows the server to download and store information on the client machine that is not explicitly requested by the user.
When I implemented my own Gopher server, I found that even Gopher has complexity I do not need or want. This is why I am doing this.
This document is 988 words long. The official Gopher specification is 5395 words long. The official HTTP 1.1 specification is 61904 words long.
#internet #protocol #tcp #file-server #hypertext #http #gemini #gopher #minus #minus-protocol
#Microsoft Calls #Firefox’s #Browser #Workaround “Improper,” Will #Block It
source: https://www.howtogeek.com/768727/microsoft-calls-firefoxs-browser-workaround-improper-will-block-it/
The upcoming Windows Update won’t block you from changing the default browser in #Windows 11. The #patch will force links using the microsoft-edge #protocol to always open in #Edge. These are specific links opened through Windows 11, such as those directly from the taskbar’s search feature. Firefox’s workaround and EdgeDeflector made it so these links would still open in your default browser. Microsoft is about to roll out an update that disables this workaround, calling it “improper” on Mozilla’s part
#freedom #openSource #software #economy #win11 #windows11 #news
Mark #Zuckerberg to be named in major #privacy lawsuit - Protocol — The people, power and politics of tech ⚓ https://www.protocol.com/mark-zuckerberg-dc-privacy-lawsuit ䷉ #protocol | more in http://schestowitz.com/2021/10/21/#latest
