Computers & Networked Information                                                                                  Computer Science 1604

Gopher No Picture

Gopher is a tool for burrowing through the information available on the Internet. It was developed as a CWIS at the University of Minnesota, hence its name. By now, Gopher servers and clients exist world-wide. Gopher provides an easy to use menu system for browsing through the information available on the Internet. If you find an article, graphic, or software of interest, Gopher will download it to your machine. While Gopher is not as flashy as Mosaic or Netscape, many people find that it is easier and faster to use.

                   Internet Gopher Information Client v1.11

                      Root gopher server: vtucs.cc.vt.edu

 -->  1.  Welcome to the Virginia Tech Gopher/
      2.  Search all menus on this server 
      3.  General Information about Virginia Tech/
      4.  Colleges and Departments/
      5.  Research Centers/
      6.  Virginia Tech Library/
      7.  Faculty and Staff Information/
      8.  Information for Students/
      9.  Directories/
      10. News, Schedules and Events/
      11. Governance/
      12. Administration/
      13. Information Systems/
      14. Blacksburg Electronic Village Gopher/
      15. Other Information Services/


Press ? for Help, q to Quit, u to go up a menu             
          Page: 1/1

Quasi-HyperText

Gopher does not fully implement the concept of hypertext. Limited hypertext link traversal is provided through double-clicking on the Gopher items (Mac & Windows), or positioning the selection arrow, -->, and hitting return on character interface clients.

Gopher Items

Gopher items can be directories, text files, images, search forms, etc.; anything you can fetch (download or execute) in Gopher is an item. In WSGopher, each item has it's own specialized window.

Fetching items in Gopherspace is analogous to traversing hyperlinks on the WWW. Each fetched item will open in a new window.


Missing items results in server errors. When encountering missing items use the top outline button to traverse to the server's default item in order to locate the desired information. Most missing item errors are caused by item reorganization at remote sites.

Gopher Clients

The University of Minnesota always has the latest versions of Gopher for all flavors of computers. Just 
	ftp   boombox.micro.umn.edu

		and then

	cd pub/gopher

If you do not have a Gopher client on your machine, you can still use Gopher by telnetting to a Gopher site such as teach.virginia.edu or consultant.micro.umn.edu with a login ID of gopher. Telnet can be done through the Virginia Tech terminal servers (CALL VTTELNET from the CBX) with Kermit or TinCan.

Home Gopher Server

You can pick the Gopher server that your client uses when you start Gopher; this is known as your HOME GOPHER. At Virginia Tech, the home Gopher is gopher.vt.edu at port 70. There are many other VT Gophers as well as the one run by the Blacksburg Electronic Village. 

    
                       Other Virginia Tech Gopher Servers

 -->  1.  Virginia Tech Library Gopher/
      2.  Virginia Tech Library Electronic Journals Gopher/
      3.  Virginia Cooperative Extension Gopher/
      4.  Virginia Tech Cad Lab/
      5.  Computer Science Undergrad Gopher/
      6.  English Department Gopher/
      7.  English EBBS Gopher Server/
      8.  Project GeoSim - Geography Education Software/
      9.  Agricultural Biotechnology Gopher/

Bookmarks

If you find a site that you would like to access frequently, you can save a bookmark for it. The bookmark allows you to directly reach that site without going through intervening menus. On UNIX systems enter an "a" to add a menu item to the list of bookmarks.

For Windows you can add bookmarks by choosing Add BookMark from the Bookmark menu. If you have selected a default category, the bookmark will be added to it. If you do not have a category selected, and you can tell by going to the Bookmark menu and choosing Categories , you will be prompted about the category to file the new bookmark under. To use a bookmark, choose Fetch from the Bookmark menu. 

lqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqk
 x                                                         
                  x
 x Name for this bookmark?   Virginia Tech Library
Electronic Journals Gopher x
 x                                                         
                  x
 x                                       [Cancel ^G]
[Accept - Enter]         x
 x                                                         
                  x

mqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqj
To view your bookmarks, enter a "v". 
 
                                   Bookmarks

 -->  1.  Virginia Tech Library Electronic Journals Gopher/
      2.  Computer Science Undergrad Gopher/

Where Did That Come From?

One advantage, or disadvantage, of Gopher depending upon your way of thinking, is that you never know where the information you have found actually resides. Of course, with bookmarks the location is not actually all that important but it does bother some people. If you would like to see where a particular menu item resides, you can. 
		Macintosh:		press command I
		UNIX box:		press =
		Windows:		press Control I

Help!

If you need help using Gopher on a UNIX system, just enter a "?" at the prompt. Macintosh and Windows systems have help as a menu item.
Use the Arrow Keys or vi/emacs equivalent to move around

Up ..................:  Move to previous line.
Down ................:  Move to next line.
Right Return ........:  "Enter"/Display current item.
Left, u  ............:  "Exit" current item/Go up a level.

>, +, Pgdwn, space ..:  View next page.
<, -, Pgup, b .......:  View previous page.

0-9 .................:  Go to a specific line.
m   .................:  Go back to the main menu.

Bookmarks
---------
a : Add current item to the bookmark list.
A : Add current directory/search to bookmark list.
v : View bookmark list.
d : Delete a bookmark/directory entry.

Other commands
--------------
s : Save current item to a file.
D : Download a file.
q : Quit with prompt.
Q : Quit unconditionally.
= : Display Technical information about current item.
O : change options
/ : Search for an item in the menu.
n : Find next search item.

Veronica

Veronica (the Very Easy Rodent-Oriented Netwide Index to Computerized Archives) is a Gopher tool that allows keyword searches of the information on Gopher. A link to it is found on the "All Gopher Servers in the World" menu: "Search Gopherspace using Veronica." Information on using Veronica is available from that menu.

Further Reading


Gopher Tutorials
Introductory Gopher Tutorials

Author: J. Watson
Curator: Computer Science Dept : VA TECH © Copyright 1994.
Last Updated: 10/10/95