gemini://gemini.ctrl-c.club/~lettuce/rss-added.gmi

You may be reading this on Gemini or on the world wide web. In any case, this blog is actually a gemlog aka a gemini capsule, or whatever you want to call it. I actually write and host this in the Gemini protocol's gemtext format, and I browse/read my own and many other sites on Gemini. But I do also convert my own gemlog to html via my own Geminut program for those that are using web browsers and not gemini clients.

In gemtext, we have a built-in format for creating a "feed." It is a companion specification that allows for easily subscribing to a regularly updated gemini page, like the index of a site.

This makes it simple to subscribe to any gemlog I read, and for me to post all of my gemlog updates to Antenna. But I've had enough requests for a RSS feed for my http readers for a while now that I decided I should scratch that itch for folks that have been requesting it. I waited so long because I wanted to come up with an automated way to generate the RSS feed from the gemlog's index page but I never quite came up with an elegant solution - I'm sure some good sed or awk brute-forcing could probably do it, but in the meantime, I've just decided to hand write the rss myself. So here it is if you want to subscribe with a RSS reader for the html version of this weblog.

Note: Send me notes if you have suggestions for an easy bash, lua or similar script to automate generating this, or a solution for fields you'd like me to add to the RSS.

One of my fave lighweight web browsers is Dillo. Originally created in 1999, the project is nearing on 25 years old.

> Dillo is a web browser designed to be fast, use few resources and support slow and unreliable networks on resource-constrained machines. It can load local and remote files via HTTP, HTTPS and FTP. Other protocols like Gemini, Gopher, IPFS and others are available as plugins.

But the browser had stagnated a lot in the past decade. According to the website, the layout engine developer passed in 2016. Development stopped in 2017. A previous lead maintainer stepped away in 2019, and the main website was lost in 2022. But now, after a change in the lead maintainer, Dillo has been receiving a ton of development work this year. Two weeks ago it had a milestone release of Dillo 3.1. It adds some additional CSS support. There are plugins for Gemini, Gopher, IPFS, Spartan protocol and man pages.

This version of Dillo was a 600k download for me, about 1.8mb fully installed. It runs on so many old devices. Check out the gallery of Dillo images in the wild. I'm a fan.

Incidentally, my Dillo gemini plugin broke with the update so I will have to spend some time figuring out why.

Dillo isn't Firefox or Chrome. It's not Links. It's its own thing. But I like it and you may too. Give it a try.

To leave a comment, email lettuce at the ctrl-c.club domain and mention the post, your comment and how you should be listed.

RSS added, Dillo updated

Part 2: Dillo gets an update