The Sinclair QL Forum

Anyone ever try to create a SlipKnot-style browser for the QL? I had completely forgotten about it until I recently started thinking about using my retro wifi modem on my classic Mac and how I could web browse with it. That got me to recall using a non TCP/IP browser in the mid 90s and googling got me to SlipKnot. It basically connected via modem to a Unix system and then used Unix commands and Lynx to shuttle web stuff back locally to display the page. I remember using it back in the day and though it was pretty slow it still kind of worked.

I found a copy on Archive.org and got it presently running on a virtual Windows XP system and will see if I can't serially connect to a Linux system to get it to display some web pages. If that works, I'm sure it's possible to use my retro wifi modem to telnet into a site that, instead of giving a BBS interface, gives a Linux/UNIX shell instead which would then create the web browser.

bwinkel67 wrote:Anyone ever try to create a SlipKnot-style browser for the QL? I had completely forgotten about it until I recently started thinking about using my retro wifi modem on my classic Mac and how I could web browse with it. That got me to recall using a non TCP/IP browser in the mid 90s and googling got me to SlipKnot. It basically connected via modem to a Unix system and then used Unix commands and Lynx to shuttle web stuff back locally to display the page. I remember using it back in the day and though it was pretty slow it still kind of worked.

I found a copy on Archive.org and got it presently running on a virtual Windows XP system and will see if I can't serially connect to a Linux system to get it to display some web pages. If that works, I'm sure it's possible to use my retro wifi modem to telnet into a site that, instead of giving a BBS interface, gives a Linux/UNIX shell instead which would then create the web browser.

Sounds like brow.sh is the modern equivalent of that. Works relatively well on a 80x25 serial console.

XorA wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 9:36 am Sounds like brow.sh is the modern equivalent of that. Works relatively well on a 80x25 serial console.

I'm reading about it now but still confused. If it runs in a SSH terminal, how is it able to display graphics?

"Browsh is a fully-modern text-based browser. It renders anything that a modern browser can; HTML5, CSS3, JS, video and even WebGL. Its main purpose is to be run on a remote server and accessed via SSH/Mosh"

bwinkel67 wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 9:50 am

XorA wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 9:36 am Sounds like brow.sh is the modern equivalent of that. Works relatively well on a 80x25 serial console.

I'm reading about it now but still confused. If it runs in a SSH terminal, how is it able to display graphics?

"Browsh is a fully-modern text-based browser.

It's not. See highlight above.

tofro wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 11:01 am It's not. See highlight above.

But videos that I saw show them displaying pictures and even playing videos...that's what I'm confused about:

https://www.brow.sh/

snip
The only dependency is a recent 57+ version of Firefox.
snip

Greetings from Switzerland
Markus

Ok, I think I know what it's doing:

Text-Based Rendering:
Browsh displays web pages using text characters, simulating basic graphics with techniques like UTF-8 half-block characters, making it suitable for situations where a full graphical interface isn't available or bandwidth is limited.

I guess like ZX81 block graphics but in color and assuming the connection is fast enough it can also do moving images for videos. So not like SlipKnot, that had a client-side program that rendered and used server-side commands through its modem login connection to a UNIX server to do the internet browsing. But it's this latter approach that would solve getting a browser to work on a QL. It would have to be smart to not render images right away, or be really efficiently written...it would be interesting to see.

But with the various retro wifi modems out there, a SlipKnot-style browser could make a cool retro project to get machines like the QL, Amiga, Atari, Mac on the internet more easily. Sure, some have the ability to actually support TCP/IP, but I doubt the earlier models could. I did ask on a Discord server about possibly finding the source, since it was a shareware project. Would be cool to revive it as a github project and see if it could be easily ported form the version that was written for early Windows.

bwinkel67 wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 11:56 am
I guess like ZX81 block graphics but in color and assuming the connection is fast enough it can also do moving images for videos. So not like SlipKnot, that had a client-side program that rendered and used server-side commands through its modem login connection to a UNIX server to do the internet browsing. But it's this latter approach that would solve getting a browser to work on a QL. It would have to be smart to not render images right away, or be really efficiently written...it would be interesting to see.

Re-sampling images to the lower text resolution in real-time (or at least endurable time) would be way beyond the capabilities of a QL or QL-alike, IMHO. (Note that is actually more work than rendering the images directly - The QL has no text mode. Even text is graphics).

No offense intended, but: I really don't get it why people repeatedly come back to the idea of having a working browser on the QL. Much more capable 68k platforms like high-end Amigas or Atari STs have failed on that before. Even on an Amiga Vampire v4 (which has capabilities way beyond anything we have) browsing the Web is still a very boring experience.

tofro wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 2:07 pm <>
No offense intended, but: I really don't get it why people repeatedly come back to the idea of having a working browser on the QL. Much more capable 68k platforms like high-end Amigas or Atari STs have failed on that before. Even on an Amiga Vampire v4 (which has capabilities way beyond anything we have) browsing the Web is still a very boring experience.

Simple HTML works well enough, and pages, including images, designed specifically for the QL environment might work. But, IIRC, even a RasPI B4 struggles to render modern web pages in something like Firefox.

tofro wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 2:07 pm Re-sampling images to the lower text resolution in real-time (or at least endurable time) would be way beyond the capabilities of a QL or QL-alike, IMHO. (Note that is actually more work than rendering the images directly - The QL has no text mode. Even text is graphics).

I think the way SlipKnot works, that could be on the server side and a more suitable image could be transferred over to load more quickly. That's how SlipKnot worked in the day on pre-Windows 95.

tofro wrote: Sat Mar 08, 2025 2:07 pm No offense intended, but: I really don't get it why people repeatedly come back to the idea of having a working browser on the QL. Much more capable 68k platforms like high-end Amigas or Atari STs have failed on that before. Even on an Amiga Vampire v4 (which has capabilities way beyond anything we have) browsing the Web is still a very boring experience.

None taken. I think that comment could be said about any endeavor that a hobbyist applies to their favorite machine. I'm sure there are people out there wondering why the heck we use limited hardware and/or software when better stuff is available and some free (i.e. Linux as an OS for example vs the latest Amiga OS, SMSQ/E, TOS, etc...).