The gopher service is quite sophisticated, in that it allows you easy access to a variety of services on the Internet all rolled into a single package.
Sadly, very few Linux distributions include a gopher client so that you will need to get hold of a copy separately before you can use it. This is not as big a problem as it sounds as many of the large Internet Linux mirror sites do carry copies. For example, you can ftp to:
src.doc.ic.ac.uk
and find the Linux specific version of gopher in the suns ite mirror in the directory:
lunix/Linux/sunsite.unc-mirror/system/Network/info-systems
The gopher service itself is provided by a network of server machines. Each of the servers holds its own list of files and information available on that server plus a set of links to give access to resources on other servers.
When you run the gopher client on your local machine, you specify the hostname of the server, which will form your starting point into the gopher network. For example:
$ gopher gopher.doc.ic.ac.uk
Having executed this command, you will be presented with the root menu from your chosen gopher server. Typically, this will appear as a numbered list with a highlighting arrow alongside one of the menu items:
Root gopher server: gopher.doc.ic.ac.uk 1. Welcome to the src.doc.ic.ac.uk gopher server. --> 2. Gopher Services/ 3. astronomy/ 4. biology/ 5. computing/ 6. gnu/ 7. ic.doc/ 8. info/ 9. packages/ 10. rfc/ 11. science/ 12. ukuug/ 13. unix/ 14. usenet/ 15. weather/ Press ? for Help, q to Quit, u to go up a menu Page: 1/1
Using the arrow keys to move the pointer up and down the menu, you make a selection by pressing the enter key. This will then take you on to another menu. The following submenu was reached by taking option 2 from the root menu of this gopher server: Gopher Services
1. Hosts and peoplel --> 2. Other gopher serversi 3. Useful college servicesl Press ? for Help, q to Quit, u to go up a menu Page: 1/1
This process of navigating through menus on your server and following links to menus on other servers continues until you reach documents on your topic of interest. In the menus, items with a slash (/) character after them indicate that selecting this option will get you to another submenu. Other entries are files which will be retrieved if selected.
Even with the menu system for navigating gopherspace (as the network of gopher databases is known) there is still the problem of knowing just where to look to find a particular subject area. Just as ftp uses archie to locate particular files so gopher uses its own search program called veronica. To use veronica you enter a set of keywords as a query and the program searches through a huge database of file and menu titles to locate appropriate items, which you can then retrieve as required.
For all its power and flexibility, gopher is rapidly being superseded by the world wide web as this provides all the functionality of gopher and much more besides.