* * * * *

          Unfortunately, my blog on Gopher is a second class citizen

I will be the first to admit that my blog on gopher [1] is a second-class
citizen. When I wrote the gopher server [2] I took the quickest and easiest
way to adapt my blog to a (close enough) text-only medium by feeding requests
through Lynx [3]. Note I didn't say “well done” (of course not! I said it was
a “medium!” Ba-dum-bump! I'll be here all week! Don't forget to tip the wait
staff!) or even pretty.

For instance, this entry [4] looks like this via gopher:

> Extreme contradiction, Brevard edition
>
> So Bunny and I came across this lovely bit of signage in downtown
>  [1]Brevard:
>
> [“The white zone is for immediate loading and unloading of passengers only.
>  There is no stopping in the red zone.” / “The red zone is for immediate
>  loading and unloading of passengers only. There is no stopping in the
> white
>  zone.” / “No, the white zone is for loading of passengers and there is no
>  stopping in a RED zone.” / “The red zone has always been for loading and
>  unloading of passengers. There's never stopping in a white zone.” / “Don't
>  you tell me which zone is for loading, and which zone is for stopping!”]
>
> So which is it? Loading, or parking? Or loading of wheelchairs for parking?
>  Or parking for wheelchairs to be loaded? I'm so confused!
>
> References
>
> 1. https://www.cityofbrevard.com/
>

First off, there's no indication that there's a photo on that page, unless
you realize I'm using a very old web convention of describing the image
contents by placing said description inside of square brackets.

Secondly, there is no actual link [5] to the picture on the converted entry.

Third, on most (all?) graphical browsers, just holding the mouse over the
images will pop up the text above (I don't think many people know about
this).

And fourth, the text is a reference to the movie “Airplane! [6]” which does
fit the subject of the picture on that page, which is of two traffic signs
giving conflicting parking directions (this really doesn't have anything to
do with the second-class status of the post on gopher—just more of an FYI
(For Your Information) type of thing).

I used Lynx because I didn't want to bother writing code to convert HTML
(HyperText Markup Language) to plain text—especially when I had access to a
tool that can do it for me. It's just that it doesn't really do a great job
because I expect the HTML to do the formatting for me. And I really do need
to write a description of the photo in addition to the caption I include for
each picture. Ideally, it would look something like:

> Extreme contradiction, Brevard edition
>
> So Bunny and I came across this lovely bit of signage in downtown
>  Brevard [1]:
>
> [Image of two traffic signs one above the other. The upper one says
>  “NO PARKING, LOADING ZONE” and the lower one saying “RESERVED PARKING
>  for the HANDICAPPED”—“The white zone is for immediate loading and
>  unloading of passengers only. There is no stopping in the red zone.” /
>  “The red zone is for immediate loading and unloading of passengers only.
>  There is no stopping in the white zone.” / “No, the white zone is for
>  loading of passengers and there is no stopping in a RED zone.” / “The
>  red zone has always been for loading and unloading of passengers. There's
>  never stopping in a white zone.” / “Don't you tell me which zone is for
>  loading, and which zone is for stopping!”] [2]
>
> So which is it? Loading, or parking? Or loading of wheelchairs for parking?
>  Or parking for wheelchairs to be loaded? I'm so confused!
>
> References
>
> [1] https://www.cityofbrevard.com/
>  [2] gopher://gopher.conman.org/IPhlog:2019/06/13/Confusion.jpg
>

And then reality sets in and I'm just not up to writing an HTML-to-text
translator right now.

Sigh.

Sorry, gopherspace.

[1] gopher://gopher.conman.org:70/1phlog.gopher
[2] gopher://gopher.conman.org:70/1Gopher:Src:
[3] https://lynx.invisible-island.net/
[4] gopher://gopher.conman.org/0Phlog:2019/06/13.1
[5] gopher://gopher.conman.org/IPhlog:2019/06/13/Confusion.jpg
[6] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080339/

Email author at [email protected]

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