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Using LYNX, A World Wide Web Client For Terminals

Yes, MOSAIC is a great program -- a visual extravaganza. But it is not always the available choice. What if you want to access the World Wide Web from home over a modem? Or from the Regent 20 terminals sitting in the HKN lounge? Or say you just wanted to look up something quickly and don't wish to log into a workstation. What you need is LYNX!

LYNX is a full-featured World Wide Web (WWW) client for users running cursor-addressable, character-cell display devices (e.g., vt100 terminals, vt100 emulators running on PCs or Macs, or any other "curses-oriented" display). It will display HyperText Markup Language (HTML) documents containing links to files residing on the local system, as well as files residing on remote systems running Gopher, HTTP, FTP, WAIS, and NNTP servers. (This includes the WWW servers for the Schools of Engineering.) While LYNX will not display inline images and other binary files internally the way MOSAIC is able to, it does have support for saving and displaying such files externally. For example, LYNX will try to automatically determine if it is running under X Windows. If so, it will use an external program such as xv or xloadimage to display images and other binary data. If you are running LYNX from a dumb terminal, it will ask you if you want to save the file to disk so you can view it later.

LYNX version 2.2 is currently available to users of ECN Sun4 machines. All documentation for LYNX is available online from within LYNX itself by pressing ?. This article is meant only as a brief introduction to help get you started using LYNX and as a quick reference to the most commonly used commands and features.

LYNX is started from the command line with the command lynx . This should launch you into LYNX and pull up the home page (or main page) for the Schools of Engineering:

Parts of the Screen

The last two lines of the screen are a summary of the most important keys and commands, as described below:

arrow keys

These are the most important keys in LYNX. The arrows are used to navigate through the links on the page. Use the up and down arrows to select the previous and next links, respectively. Right follows the currently highlighted link, and left goes back to the document you just came from.

h or ?

Help. This takes you to a list of several help files which you can read: a description of commands, an in-depth introduction to LYNX, and documentation on HTML and URLs.

o

Options. Brings up a screen of options that allow you to customize LYNX to your liking.

p

Print. Brings up a list of various things you can do with the current document, including print, mail and save. This option is detailed below.

g

Go (to a URL). Allows you to specify a specific URL which you would like to view.

m

(Go to the) main screen. Returns you to the first document you saw when you started LYNX (defaults to the Schools of Engineering home page). You can change this by specifying a different URL on the command line. The following command line, for example, specifies the ECN page as your home page.

lynx http://www.ecn.purdue.edu/ECN/

q

Quit . Quits from LYNX.

Search

Searches for a string in the current file.

[delete]

History list. Brings up a list of all of the links you have traveled through to reach the current point. If you entered a document and then exited it using the left arrow, it will not be in the history stack. If you entered a document and left it by selecting another link, it will be in the history stack.

[space]

The space bar advances the display to the next page.

There are a couple of important commands not in the 2 line menu:

d

Download the current link. Enables you to perform actions on the currently selected link without trying to retrieve it first. This is a very useful command for non-text files, such as graphics, movies or audio files. Currently, this option only supports saving the file to disk but should soon allow you to download the file straight to your own computer using zmodem or xmodem when using LYNX over a modem.

Search (an index). If the current page is a searchable index, for example a database, s will allow you to enter your search string.

v

View bookmarks. This brings up your bookmark file.

a

Add current document to your hotlist. See the article Using Bookmarks and Hotlists for further information on both of these commands.

The print command, p is used for several different operations, asmentioned earlier. Pressing p brings up a menu with the following selections:

Save to a local file

Allows you to save a copy of the current document.

Mail the file to yourself

Asks you for an e-mail address to which the current document will be mailed. This can be any e-mail address, not just your own.

Print to the screen

Cats the current document to the screen.

Specify your own print command

Allows you to specify which printer you wish to use. Use something like:

lpr -Pprintername

I am confident that after running LYNX for just a couple of minutes, you will be very comfortable with its use. Keep this article handy for a brief review of the important keys and see the online documentation for more in-depth help, including information on other features of LYNX. If you have further questions that are not covered there, see an ECN consultant.

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