Re: lynx-dev Lynx does not open some http sites, forces download

[Mykola Sereda]

        In reference to the posting:

>From: David Woolley <address@hidden>
>Subject: Re: lynx-dev Lynx does not open some http sites, forces download
>Date: Tue, 02 Feb 1999 07:58:43 GMT

MS>         Summary of my opinion: the error is not related to the
MS> version number. The error is caused by MIME, or more precisely,
MS> the disorder that its implementation introduces in the transmission
MS> of 8 bit text files.

>HTTP from 1.0 onwards has *always* been MIME based.  There is no excuse
>like that which might apply to email for not correctly labelling
>the content type;  in fact, most of HTTP is about correctly labelling
>the content type.

        You miss my point. The introduction of MIME into the mail
exchanges introduced the trouble where before there was none, as long
as the transmission was done in 8 bit. The acceptance of MIME in HTTP
introduced the potential for trouble from the very start. It used to
be OK, as long as MIME was ignored or bypassed. But now that a blind
compliance spreads, so grows the trouble.

        Why label the contents? Why should a user leaf through some
labels which have no interest to him? Such as, for me, some "Taiwanese"
or a pile of other nuisance, including "NeXT" and other choices? And
what will happen, when all the other deserving world cultures and
CharSets will be registered? The choices will go into some hundreds ... 

        Instead, the 8 bit texts should be transmitted or displayed
automatically without any bargaining. If I hit some Taiwanese site,
and the display would be incompehensible, what difference it makes
whether it is incomprehesensible because I do not know Taiwanese,
or whether on top of it, it is incompehensible to someone who unlike
me understands Taiwanese, the text being improperly displayed? If
someone wishes to read Taiwanese, or Ukrainian, or whatever, let him
take care of displaying Taiwanese, or Ukrainian - but let him receive
it integrally. 
                

>However, I believe, *current* versions of Lynx do have some options for
>dealing with material falsely labelled as being in the default (8859/1)
>character set, at least when this is done by defaulting the character set.

        The straightforward 8 bit text should be the default. 


>As someone in a non-Latin1 country, you should be championing the correct
>labelling of web material so that it can be correctly displayed throughout
>the world.

        Leaving aside your guess about the country I am in, I wonder
what motivates your desire to tell me and other users of non Latin
character sets, what is best for us.

        This also brings up the memory of your countryman, Orwell,
author of a widely known public image of a Big Brother who knows what's
good for the masses. Actually, Orwell, who drew his inspiration from
Soviet Union, understood nothing about that country; like you now
about the present situation, I am tempted to remarc ;-) At that time,
and until the death of Stalin, the official propaganda line proclaimed,
that while all people and nationalities were equal, they nevertherless
owed their allegiance and love to the Older Brother, The Great Russian
Folk. The posters to this effect were everywhere, I recall, and teachers 
in school classes were supposed to recite this mantra ...


>It's only really Microsoft who think they know better than the content-type.

        I do not see what Microsoft has to do with the Subject.

--
    Mykola Sereda <address@hidden>