Re: lynx-dev Lynx dev

[Larry W. Virden]

From: Jamie Ellis <address@hidden>

>Our arrangement with the Provincial Department of Education limits us to
>providing member clients text based dial up access only (although we do
>have a regular WWW Graphical presense.

>Our members are demanding graphics! 'Text is anachronistic,' I hear. Be

Are they?  How many of the members?  What types of machines are they using
and what types of modems?  Frankly, graphics are the _least_ of what
_I_ find missing when surfing the WWW using lynx... javascript is the most
missing, and there's experimental support for that now!

>that as it may, it raises the question, what sort of server side
>improvements can be made to gussy up the appearance of Lynx? We have a

I can think of Nothing that could easily be done for your users.  The
problem is this - they are dialing into your system and running lynx there.
To get graphics shown at all, the lynx would have to some how call across
that dial in to talk to the machine (what kind of machine?  Solaris? Linux?
MacOS?  Windows?  Windows 95?  Windows 98?  Windows NT?  OS/2?  VMS?  Other?)
and send it binary files AND tell it how to display those files.

Now, the user _could_ run the lynx at their machine, configure it for their
own system, and just 'pass thru' your servers - but that would take a LOT
more hand holding for non-technical users...  And at that point, why would
they not just use Netscape or IE or Opera, etc.?
-- 
Larry W. Virden                 <URL: mailto:address@hidden>
<URL: http://www.purl.org/NET/lvirden/> <*> O- "No one is what he seems."
Unless explicitly stated to the contrary, nothing in this posting should 
be construed as representing my employer's opinions.