To Glenn (and anybody else who might be interested), Finding Arachne was like finding gold. Thank you Michael for the vision and original creation. Thank you Glenn and others for the improvements.
I do humanitarian work in remote places that aren't computer friendly (or sometimes even people friendly). A Win-doze and Pentium system doesn't work well when run from a car battery, at least in the long run. A good, solid 486 (running DOS) is perfect. Arachne is a great overlay for all of the reasons which keep us on this list. My particular use of Arachne is as a viewer for HTML documents. If I stay away from Javascript, most of the information pages on the web are useable by Arachne, which makes my 486-DOS-Arachne system a state-of-the-art learning platform in remote villages. Sometimes the only light at night is the glow from the (battery powered) monitor. THE PROBLEMS >From my perspective, HTML is an easily learned code that can quickly (within hours, if not minutes) transform the text in documents from one language to another. Therefore, my desire is to enable people in remote locations to use computers as learning tools and data management platforms. Two things keep me from those goals. The first problem is that Arachne is a browser, not simply a viewer. Since it has communication capability, I can't use it in some of the most needy places. A lot of nations ban or limit external access to information, and Arachne doesn't fit into their paradigm. How can they control what is, essentially, a hacker's paradise? The second problem is that nobody has yet configured an easily useable HTML-GUI for a DOS database (I'm looking at DataPerfect, a free database for DOS). THE PROPOSED SOLUTIONS The Viewer - It seems to me that it would be a simple matter to remove elements from the Arachne code. Of course, it would no longer be Arachne (the web traveller). But, the limited version could be a learning tool (the initial first step) between computer ignorance and Internet literacy. I would suggest a different name to avoid confusion. My current project 'code name' is TISAP (The Internet Simulation Architecture Program), but that's just my humble offering. At any rate, would it be possible (i.e., would anybody be interested) to create a VIEWER that had absolutely no communication capability (even any hidden code) and could run directly from a CD-ROM (without writing anything to a hard disk)? The Database - Not too far back in history, some guys used CGIs to create an HTML interface between web pages and DataPerfect. The latest version of that effort is called Firestorm. I've attach a portion of a recent email with one of the author's. - - - - - - Bruce Conrad [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: - The work that Thom and Lew and I did in 1995-96 - is called Firestorm, and is documented in a sparse - way on the website at http://www.sanbachs.net/firestorm/ - from which the complete source code can also be downloaded. - - - - - Just about everything necessary is on that web site (contacts, source code, info, etc.), so anybody on this list could follow this trail. I'm not a code writer, so much of the technical stuff is beyond my understanding. However, I can see (from the site and previous emails) that it would be possible to create an Arachne (and TISAP ???) GUI for databases. IN SUMMARY Arachne is a very useful tool for me, but my major limitation is the political environment. Leaving political arguments for another day, is it possible to work a bit 'within the system' to create a useful product for the millions who are limited by government restrictions? Could I also offer the challenge of cracking the code (literally) and creating an easily modified (by changing the HTML text), graphical front end for database management? That would be an AWESOME addition to Arachne. Waiting eagerly for a positive response <grin>, Bob Dohse - ________________________________________________________________ Sign Up for Juno Platinum Internet Access Today Only $9.95 per month! Visit www.juno.com
