A proxy for Web pages in Gemini

[Luke Emmet]

On 11-Feb-2021 07:18, Andreas R. wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 10, 2021 at 10:46:34PM +0000, Nader K. Rad wrote:
>> Hello everyone,
>> I'm new here, and I've set up my Gemini capsule only a couple of days ago. I was writing a new article today when I had to reference a Web page, and I started thinking: What if there's a Web proxy for Gemini?
>>
>> For example, if the proxy is at gemini://example.proxy, and the writer wants to link to https://example.com, they can add a link to gemini://example.proxy?https://example.com.
> I have set up
> gemini://webgate.geminet.org/web.sh
> for that occasion.
>
> It's a simple cgi-script that uses gemget and duckling proxy.
>
> I still need to patch duckling proxy to rewrite all the hrefs in the html document, so you can follow them without
> leaving gemini, but for now, for a single referenced page on the web, it might already be useful.

Great to hear you found another way of using Duckling Proxy, but using 
it in this way does make for a more opaque and constrained web 
experience than it needs to. Really Duckling is intended as a scheme 
specific proxy - ie. you configure your client so it handles *any* web 
request transparently. In this way you don't need to rewrite any URLs 
and its always clear what URL you are visiting.

Also the other side of the coin is that you make it harder for visitors 
to your gemini page to make their own decision how to open the URL. Some 
users will prefer to launch the system browser, others will use a client 
that could render the web page directly, and yet others still will use a 
scheme proxy. By wiring up the web link yourself, you constrain the end 
user to control that aspect of the experience themselves.

Another, perhaps better fix, might be to update the client so it can use 
a scheme specific proxy like Duckling (HTTP) or Agena (Gopher) and share 
the update. There are a few that support this intrinsic gemini concept 
(GemiNaut, Amfora, Lagrange, AV-98, Diohsc off the top of my head).

But each to their own!

   - Luke