Re: LYNX-DEV Possible "proxy autoconfigure" like MSIE/Netscape?

[David Woolley]

> 
> Just wondering if it would be possible for Lynx to take advantage of
> ".pac" files, which MSIE and Netscape now have for automatic proxy/cache
> configuration.  Here's a sample:


The problem with these is that they are almost certainly handled by
a general script interpreter for the language (Javascript?) so supporting
them in any but a hacked way requires Javascript support first.

Also, I believe that script handling is modularised, with the browser
having a basic concept of scripts and handing the details to an external
module.  Lynx would really need to go that way if it is not to get totally
bloated.  (This is certainly how Microsoft do server side scripting.)

Once you realise that you need a Javascript interpreter, you also need to
make the browser obey the object model assumed by Javascript.


The hacked approach would be to assume that most ISPs/internal network
services departments, will not bother to learn how to program .pac's properly,
so the results will be very stereotyped, and it will be possible to match
a pattern without any deep analysis of the script.  If there is sufficient
demand, I'm sure that someone will implement using this approach, but the
end result is likely to be dead weight if proper scripting is subsequently
implemented.


Overall, I would say that this was one of the many cases where one can't
say that it won't be done, but can say that doing it properly will be
quite expensive.
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