cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/24735701
See also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemini_(protocol)
It is similar to the old gopher: text files, links, and images form a hypertext optimized for reading. Text is formatted like Markdown - but even simpler.
Clients display text, like an eBook, or images / media.
Servers can run on a PC or Raspberry Pi which needs half a Watt of power. No FAANG companies needed. No expert knowledge needed - not more difficult than running a file sharing client.
I think it is the right thing for defense of democracy and sharing your voice in the digital realm.
I think the better comparison (whether that’s technically accurate or not) is to HTML + CSS + JS. Which is overly complicated for just small blogs and personal webpages etc. I think that’s the “issue” Gemini is trying to solve.
Still not an issue. Just throw out all modern web frameworks and stick to content-focused HTML. You can even do plaintext with unclickable links.
Or if you like a more readable markup with a very thin markdown layer on either the client or server side.
I think TeX is the right way.
Have you ever seen HTML without CSS? It’s ugly as hell
Depends on the client side native styles. With Gemini, those are also needed to be adjusted.
…or is it?
https://motherfuckingwebsite.com/
yes
http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com/
Whoa. An update to the HTML Hell Page!
I have 2 webpages like this. Calling them webpages is a bit of stretch to be honest. One is a joke and the other is extremely single idea only. I was just experimenting with some stuff, that’s all. But they are up and they don’t need CSS. :-)
Edit: BTW forgot to mention, you can output text only without HTML. In that case (like in the Random of the Week) you can use it in the terminal like output of a program.
I have a few (internal) web pages like that at work, they do the job but yes they are ugly
Depends to what you compare. Many CSS (worse if it uses JavaScript) is ugly and I prefer the native look without CSS. But only if the content works well, which they often don’t… And that’s ugly design.