Re: TLS in Gopher
On 2018-03-01 08:37 +0000, Iain R. Learmonth wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On 01/03/18 06:56, Zachary Lee Andrews wrote:
> > This is not the case when protocol relative URLs are used... Which, BTW,
> > is the way that `lynx -source gopher://some.gopher.server' writes URLs.
> >
> > see also: https://www.paulirish.com/2010/the-protocol-relative-url/
>
> Except that "Gopher with TLS" shouldn't need to be a distinct protocol.
> If it is then it's not Gopher anymore. If it requires a behaviour that
> is not backwards compatible with existing Gopher clients/servers then it
> is not Gopher and you've caused breakage of either URLs or clients.
>
> If you just try to perform a TLS handshake when you talk to servers and
> then cache failures and retry those with cleartext, then you've got
> Gopher with TLS in a backwards compatible way without breaking URLs.
>
> The main objection to this approach seems to be "it's hard" and that it
> requires software which hasn't currently been written.
But gopher with TLS is not gopher. The TLS handshake is not gopher. It
*is* a distinct protocol with a different behaviour. IMHO not making it
something clearly separated from gopher may cause more breakage.
You could also cache failures on the "gophers" port and retry with plain
gopher on port 70.
--
Nuno Silva
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