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Gopher
The Gopher protocol is a distributed document search and retrieval protocol designed for distributing, searching, and retrieving documents over the Internet. It preceded the World Wide Web and offered a menu-driven interface to access text-based resources. Although largely obsolete today, Gopher played a critical role in early Internet navigation and information access..
Introduced in 1991 by the University of Minnesota, the Gopher protocol was designed for a hierarchical, menu-based information delivery system across IP networks. It uses TCP port 70 by default and operates by sending selectors to servers, which respond with menus or documents. Gopher clients interpret these responses to provide users with simple navigation menus, enabling easy access to distributed text documents.
The protocol is lightweight and text-based, focusing primarily on efficiency and simplicity. Unlike the early Web's hypertext linking, Gopher’s structure is rigidly hierarchical, resembling a directory tree rather than a mesh. Communication typically involves the client sending a selector string indicating a document or menu, and the server responding with plain text data or menu listings.
While Gopher links could embed pointers to other Gopher servers or resources, it did not initially support multimedia content or complex formatting. As the Web gained popularity due to capabilities like inline graphics and a more flexible hyperlinking model, Gopher use significantly declined. Despite this, some enthusiasts maintain small Gopher servers as a nod to Internet history.