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opening gopher links from firefox in lynx | |
April 11th, 2019 | |
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I was working on a goal of adding a new protocol handler to | |
Firefox that would open gopher:// links in lynx. I think it's | |
doable based on my research, but I'm not quite able to get it | |
working. First of all, you can expose a protocol to request a new | |
handler when invoked by adding a config item to Firefox via the | |
about:config screen. | |
network.protocol-handler.expose.gopher | |
Add that entry as a boolean, and set it to false. Now the next | |
time you click on a gopher link it will prompt you for the app to | |
use. If you have a standalone gopher app with gui support, point | |
at that and you're done! YAY! | |
If you're like me and want it to launch a terminal window, start | |
lynx, and browse to that gopher hole, well... I don't quite have | |
the solve just yet. I found three potential ways to do it so far, | |
but none is actually working. | |
1. Point to a shell script that launches a terminal window running | |
lynx, and forward along the parameter. I created a bash script | |
that launched gnome-terminal and passed along the startup | |
script as lynx. Sounded good in theory, and if I invoke it from | |
the terminal myself it does indeed launch a new term running | |
lynx. That's cool, but Firefox seems to do nothing when it acts | |
as a handler. Damn. | |
2. Define a new shell app like described in this webpage [0] | |
[0] Firefox enable starting of scripts | |
3. Try to make a lynx.desktop file that will launch the lynx | |
browser. Here's mine: | |
[Desktop Entry] | |
Name=Lynx | |
Comment=Terminal Browser | |
Terminal=true | |
Type=Application | |
Exec=lynx %U | |
Categories=Application;Network; | |
That totally works once you trust it if you click on the app. | |
But it does jack shit when you try to use it as a Firefox | |
protocol handler. Ugh. | |
Guys, I feel like I'm so damn close. Who wants to be my hero and | |
swoop in and save the day. Gopher handlers will make my life 3% | |
better overnight. Don't you want to be a part of that? |