[GoLUG] No graphics browsers

[Wayne]

It's as if 'a picture's worth a thousand words'. Hey, maybe I'll trademark that one... ;-)

Anyway, I missed the meeting but tried your Wheelbuilding link in NetSurf. It worked fine. Many sites won't, due to reasons you cited.

I've built several 3-cross and 4-cross wheels in the '70s. Learned how to do it from my neighbor Tom Cutherbertson (Anybody's Bike Book). I also had a business designing bicycle frames for custom frame builders. Was an avid cyclist back then. Too old now.


On 9/3/25 8:50 PM, Steve Litt wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> Tonight, at the meeting after the meeting, we discussed browsers, and
> some opined that a no-graphics browser like lynx (links, elinks?) might
> be an improvement.
> 
> I pointed out that my Specific User Runit web page would have been
> worthless without the two block diagrams showing how runit's supervisor
> works.
> 
> Here's an even better example:
> 
> https://troubleshooters.com/bicycles/wheelbuilding/index.htm
> 
> I dare anybody to convey the same info, in an understandable and
> non-ambiguous way, without diagrams.
> 
> In order to express that same information without no more ambiguity
> than it currently has, the amount of text would probably triple. There
> would be no pronouns: names would be repeated everywhere, and would
> need to be checked for consistency. The necessary redundancy would be
> breathtaking.
> 
> There's a reason why every patent application has at least one diagram.
> A diagram keeps us "all on the same page", and unambiguously conveys
> the kind of information that text just can't.
> 
> We shouldn't blame browsers for the spectacularly invalid HTML, CSS and
> Javascript created by web authors. Most of my web pages from the last 5
> years pass w3c validation with no errors and no warnings. But for every
> one like me, there are 100 who slap together any old thing, bloated
> with ads that will yield them five dollars a month, throw 50 w3c
> validation errors, and look completely different on every browser
> because each browser take each validation error and guesses what the
> author really meant, and different browsers make different guesses.
> 
> SteveT
> 
> Steve Litt
> http://444domains.com
> 
>