[Edbrowse-dev] wiki

[Karl Dahlke <eklhad@comcast.net>]

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Ok ... I have an account, I read the article on Hypatia, pretended to edit it,
compared the article with the raw input, reverse engineered their markup
language, and wrote an edbrowse article in their style, as shown below.
The 30 second explanation:
double brackets is a hyperlink within wiki,
single brackets is a hyperlink,
'' and ''' are italics or bold or some such,
<ref> builds a source style reference, hopefully demonstrating authority,
and finally each newline is a new paragraph, which I haven't implemented yet
because long lines are nearly impossible to manage in edbrowse,
so my last step would be to ,J each paragraph together.
And then of course my wife would have to get me past the captcha.
So, should I submit such a thing, and, do you have comments thereon?
Chris, one of my external links points to the philosophy article
on my website but should it be on yours alongside edbrowse for consistency?
I will tell you that they will be leary of approving an article
whose sources are other websites, not books or papers etc,
so they might just say no,
but you have to start somewhere and that's all we have.

'''Edbrowse'''
is a combination [[Text editor|editor]],
[[Web browser|browser]],
and [[mail client]] that runs in command line mode.
It does not display files or web pages in two dimensions across the screen;
instead it accepts commands and prints responses,
much like the [[Unix shell|shell]].
Edbrowse was modeled after ed, one of the earliest Unix editors,
though there are many more features, such as editing multiple files
simultaneously and rendering web pages as text.
It is a browser that acts like ed, thus the name edbrowse.
This program was originally written for
[[Blindness|blind]] users, but many sighted users have taken advantage of its
[[Script (computer programming)|scripting]] capabilities.
A [[batch job]] or [[cron job]] can access web pages on the [[internet]], submit forms,
and send [[email]], with no human intervention whatsoever.
Edbrowse can also tap into [[database]]s through [[odbc]].
A traditional substitute command updates the corresponding row in an [[sql]] table,
and similarly for insert and delete.
This [[open-source software|open source]] package is included in several [[Linux distribution]]s
<ref>[https://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=edbrowse ''Edbrowse'' distributed by Debian]</ref>
<ref>[http://packages.ubuntu.com/lucid/edbrowse ''Edbrowse'' on ubuntu]</ref>
<ref>[https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/edbrowse-git ''Edbrowse'' on arch linux]</ref>
and in [[free BSD]]
<ref>[http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.edbrowse.devel/91 ''Edbrowse'' on free bsd]</ref>.

== Command Line Philosophy ==

Edbrowse is part of a larger philosophy,
wherein editors, browsers, mail clients, spreadsheets, and other critical [[computer application|applications]]
are rewritten from the ground up if necessary
to support various [[disability|disabilities]].
Once this is done,
Other programs
can leverage these tools,
and be immediately accessible to a wide range of computer users.
[[Web site]]s and [[web based]] utilities,
for example,
become accessible through customized browsers.
These include [[Internet Printing Protocol|printer management]] (port 631) and [[samba (software)|swat]] (port 901)
on some systems,
and most off-the-shelf [[network router|routers]].

This stands in contrast to the [[Front_and_back_ends|front end]] approach,
which modifies or enhances the input/output layer and leaves the applications alone.
[[Microsoft Explorer|Explorer]], [[Microsoft Outlook|Outlook]], and [[Microsoft Word|Word]]
all run without modification,
while a [[screen reader]] such as [[Window Eyes]] converts the words or [[computer icon|icons]] into speech or [[braille]].
The adapter is written once, and maintained as stand-alone software,
supporting almost any application that anyone could write.
This has obvious technical advantages,
and is the most practical path to accessibility,
but a small minority of disabled users find the experience suboptimal.
A sighted user quickly locates items on the screen by moving his eyes,
but the efficiency and speed of this visual interface is lost when those eye movements are replaced with a mouse and a screen reader.
A command line editor, in contrast, allows the user to jump to a particular location in a file or on a web page
by searching for a text fragment or [[regular expression]].
There is more typing, but less output,
which is desirable when that output is run through the linear channel of speech or braille.

Rewriting and maintaining these large and complicated programs,
such as a browser with all its [[Browser_plugin|plugins]],
is a daunting task that has received little support from government and industry to date.
Still, the core of [[Unix]] and [[Linux]] consists of command line utilities,
starting with the shell,
and a few intrepid volunteers continue to write and maintain higher level applications
such as browsers and database editors,
to keep the command line philosophy alive.

== History ==

In 2002, Karl Dahlke wrote the first version of edbrowse in [[perl language|perl]].
It lacks many important features, such as [[javascript]] support,
but it has one overarching advantage, it is 100% portable.
It can be run on [[Linux]], [[Unix]], [[OS X]], or [[windows operating system|Windows]],
provided perl is installed.
Thus edbrowse version 1.5.7 is still available today.
It is not maintained, but curious users can run the perl version as a test,
to see if they like the edbrowse interface,
or the command line philosophy in general.

Version 2 provided limited javascript support through a home-grown javascript interpreter,
but keeping up with the ever evolving standards of [[Client-side_scripting|client side javascript]] was impractical,
so in 2008 Karl wrote version 3,
which incorporates the open source
[[SpiderMonkey (JavaScript_engine)|Spider Monkey]]
javascript engine, also used by [[Firefox_browser|FireFox]].
This gives edbrowse a decent level of javascript support,
and provides access to more websites.

== User Impressions ==

Edbrowse is sometimes described as dense in its code and in its [[human interface]].
It contains many cryptic one and two letter commands,
and few interactive help facilities.
There is no menu, no dialog, and no screen of intuitive icons to click on.
Like [[bash shell|bash]], edbrowse greets the user with a blinking cursor,
waiting for input,
and if that input is syntactically incorrect, edbrowse prints a question mark.
Thus it is important to read the edbrowse user's guide before diving in.

For those who persevere, edbrowse can become an effective multi-purpose tool
that presents one common interface for an assortment of tasks
such as editing files, managing directories, receiving email, and surfing the net.
William McEwan,
of the
[[Puppy Linux]] forum,
describes edbrowse this way.

"The first few days I tried to use this program (based partly on the old UNIX
ed) I thought I was in a living nightmare.
But its so easy now.
I can literally do it with my eyes closed.
It has its limitations,
limited javascript support and so on,
but it also comes with much potent magic."

== External Links ==

[http://the-brannons.com/edbrowse Edbrowse home page], maintained by Chris Brannon

[http://www.eklhad.net/edbrowse/philosophy.html The command line philosophy], by Karl Dahlke

[https://github.com/eklhad/acsint.git The Jupiter speech adapter], a linear speech adapter that is optimized for command line programs