Amiga.org specific forums => Amiga.org Discussion and Site Feedback => Topic started by: Karlos on February 10, 2010, 04:15:29 PM
Title: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 10, 2010, 04:15:29 PM
In response to the various complaints that this site no longer adequately supports old browsers (specifically IBrowse) on classic systems, I've cobbled together a small proxy that aims to rewrite the content in a manner more amenable to iBrowse and other non-CSS capable browsers.
It isn't complete in that a lot of pages have rendering issues or the broken features but I aim to sort those out on an as-encountered basis.
To test it, use the following link: http://aoproxy.extropia.co.uk/ (http://aoproxy.extropia.co.uk/)
Some important caveats when using the proxy:
1) Your session is with the proxy server, not with amiga.org directly. That means your proxied session will log out after half an hour or so of inactivity regardless of your preferred settings.
2) Being logged into amiga.org directly does not mean you will be logged when accessing in via the proxy.
3) If you log in via the proxy, your password hash is relayed via the proxy. It isn't logged anywhere but if you are paranoid about security then don't log in via it.
4) No warranties of any kind. It works for me. Your mileage may vary. It may go down periodically when I'm working on it.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: pVC on February 10, 2010, 04:47:19 PM
Cool. Looks pretty good (but still liked more the old design). I'll take it in use instead of the original page and report later if I find any problems :)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: tone007 on February 10, 2010, 04:52:44 PM
Great, now I'm going to have to build another Amiga to try it out since I sold all my working ones. I'm sure I've got enough parts lying around...
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 10, 2010, 05:19:44 PM
Quote from: pVC;542441
Cool. Looks pretty good (but still liked more the old design).
There isn't too much I can do about that. It isn't a different front end to amiga.org's database, it literally rewrites pages on the fly as you request them. The rewriting process is mostly intended to replace JS/CSS based popups and other things that just do not work without CSS with replacements that can. So, where possible, popup menus are replaced with
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: motorollin on February 10, 2010, 05:34:36 PM
5. If you log in to both the proxy and amiga.org, a tear will open in the space-time continuum and destroy the universe.
-- moto
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Castellen on February 10, 2010, 05:55:38 PM
Outstanding work Karlos! Using it now to post this, everything seems in order so far. No idea what the new amiga.org looks like in anything except IBrowse so I can't compare to what it's 'supposed' to be like. But your work in progress appears to be quite usable already. Keep up the great job.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: odin on February 10, 2010, 06:18:51 PM
Cool stuff, Karlos. After a thorough 30 second test with Firefox I conclude it works fine :D.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 10, 2010, 06:30:23 PM
Quote from: motorollin;542458
5. If you log in to both the proxy and amiga.org, a tear will open in the space-time continuum and destroy the universe.
-- moto
Tis OK, I made a backup....:roflmao:
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 10, 2010, 06:37:49 PM
Quote from: Castellen;542462
Outstanding work Karlos! Using it now to post this, everything seems in order so far. No idea what the new amiga.org looks like in anything except IBrowse so I can't compare to what it's 'supposed' to be like. But your work in progress appears to be quite usable already. Keep up the great job.
When I use ibrowse to access the site directly, I noticed several features I am used to seeing in CSS capable browsers have been explicitly disabled, particularly popup menus and stuff. This filtering is presumably done using your UA to detect which browser you are using.
The proxy just pretends to be a basic mozilla browser when it talks to amiga.org and thus receives the full content that firefox et al would receive. It then chops out stuff that simply can't be supported and tries to rework anything that can be. There are quite a few CSS popup menus that mostly contain links that are reworked so that you can use them again.
In removing the CSS, theoretically it should speed up your page retrieval too but that's unfortunately eclipsed by the fact you are waiting on not one HTTP connection, but two.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Gulliver on February 11, 2010, 12:45:57 AM
I am currently browsing Amiga.org with Ibrowse using your proxy, and it certainly looks and feels better than before. Thank you very much!
As positive critizism, still i find there is a lot of work to do. Without going into detail, i expected Amiga.org website too look much as Amigaworld.net now, as both websites share the same type of layout. Boy, i was wrong! :( Just make the comparison for yourself
Bottomline: @Karlos thank you very much!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: AmigaHeretic on February 11, 2010, 02:31:28 AM
@Karlos
I can't play the flash games through iBrowse?
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: HammerD on February 11, 2010, 04:04:42 AM
@karlos
thanks looks much better. I had trouble logging into the site, though. looks like it tied to go to aoproxy.extropia.co.ukforums/
like that...so maybe url is wrong? (after you click login).
Can you check that? thanks
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: motorollin on February 11, 2010, 08:01:14 AM
Quote from: Karlos;542476
Tis OK, I made a backup....:roflmao:
Those 2GB Jaz drives are handy aren't they - especially since they're out of temporal phase with the universe, so hopefully should be spared in the apocalypse.
-- moto
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Fingers on February 11, 2010, 09:03:38 AM
Thanks Karlos, excellent work! :D
PZ.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 11, 2010, 09:09:50 AM
Quote from: AmigaHeretic;542612
@Karlos
I can't play the flash games through iBrowse?
Erm.... not as far as I know :lol:
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 11, 2010, 09:12:27 AM
Quote from: HammerD;542622
@karlos
thanks looks much better. I had trouble logging into the site, though. looks like it tied to go to aoproxy.extropia.co.ukforums/
like that...so maybe url is wrong? (after you click login).
Can you check that? thanks
Redirection is one of those things that can be fiddly. Unfortunately, cURL on my server isn't allowed to chase redirects itself so I have to handle that. I've never managed to get it redirect without the slash in the URL that you show above. I'll keep it in mind.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 11, 2010, 09:15:59 AM
Quote from: Gulliver;542595
I am currently browsing Amiga.org with Ibrowse using your proxy, and it certainly looks and feels better than before. Thank you very much!
As positive critizism, still i find there is a lot of work to do. Without going into detail, i expected Amiga.org website too look much as Amigaworld.net now, as both websites share the same type of layout. Boy, i was wrong! :( Just make the comparison for yourself
Bottomline: @Karlos thank you very much!
To make a layout like aw.net would basically require custom non-CSS vbulletin skins / templates to be written or a completely new front end to the existing vbulletin database. That would be a hell of a lot of work and would end up tying the site down to the existing version just as the old site got tied to a particular version of xoops.
The primary aim of the proxy is to simply make the existing site more accessible, without having to mess around with the site itself, which I have neither the remit or inclination to do.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Gulliver on February 11, 2010, 09:57:50 AM
No @Karlos, i was speaking about how the proxy server permformed, that is what could be changed to have compatibility ala Amigaworld.net. Not Amiga.org server software, you have already stated that before!
Pehaps i wasnt clear enough :)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: mikeymike on February 11, 2010, 10:09:51 AM
Quote from: Karlos;542640
Erm.... not as far as I know :lol:
Well, get on with it! I heard that there's a JavaScript port of Flash in progress, it shouldn't be much more difficult to import it to HTML/ascii!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 11, 2010, 10:30:54 AM
Quote from: Gulliver;542644
No @Karlos, i was speaking about how the proxy server permformed, that is what could be changed to have compatibility ala Amigaworld.net. Not Amiga.org server software, you have already stated that before!
Pehaps i wasnt clear enough :)
I'm not entirely sure I get you but it you are suggesting that the proxy completely reformats the content to make a xoops style layout, then that is a bit out of the question. There's already more than enough regular expression processing going on as it is :)
Ultimately, once the proxy is a bit more mature (and I offer no timescales as it's basically a "lunchtime at work" project), I would like to be able to move it to a subdomain directly on amiga.org.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Crumb on February 11, 2010, 11:32:00 AM
Good job Karlos!
perhaps you could set as default for the proxy the use of Arial/Helvetica instead of Times? It would look much closer to the original.
Quick reply button does not appear but I guess it's completely normal
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 11, 2010, 11:38:19 AM
Quote from: Crumb;542651
Good job Karlos!
perhaps you could set as default for the proxy the use of Arial/Helvetica instead of Times? It would look much closer to the original.
Quick reply button does not appear but I guess it's completely normal
I've tried setting the font but it doesn't work reliably. Strictly speaking, is an inline element, rather than a block one, so you can't just wrap a tag around the body content and be done with it. The best bet is to make helvetica the default font in ibrowse.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Cammy on February 12, 2010, 01:05:48 AM
Thanks for going to the effort to get Amiga.org looking better for us classic users, Karlos. The site works well through your proxy on my A1200, and I'll definitely start posting from here more often again from now on if the proxy stays up.
Are you planning on making it a subdomain of Amiga.org?
I hope you don't mind me asking, but would it be possible to make the Quick Reply box show up so we don't need to load an extra page to reply? It's not a big deal, but it might help speed things up a little when posting.
Here's a photo of my A1200 running IBrowse, browsing Amiga.org through the proxy server. I'm posting this message from my A1200, too!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: save2600 on February 12, 2010, 01:10:27 AM
WOW! Been waiting to reply to this thread, but wanted to jump in to give praise and say 'thanks!' for the effort Karlos!
I don't have internet wired to any of my Miggy's at the moment, but I gotta tell 'ya, that's primarily because of the change that occurred with A.org all those months ago! lol Might have to reconfigure my setup if this is to become a reality.
Thanks again, whether I use it daily or not on a real Amiga - the sentiment and effort is much appreciated!!
Title: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Drummerboy on February 12, 2010, 01:21:55 AM
Quote from: Cammy;542772
Here's a photo of my A1200 running IBrowse, browsing Amiga.org through the proxy server. I'm posting this message from my A1200, too!
Hey Cammy we have the same PCMCIA Network card in the A1200.. :-) hehehehe
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Crumb on February 12, 2010, 01:33:06 AM
@Cammy
Game Over uh? :-) I used to play on c64, watching Luis Royo's title pictures made loading from cassete a slightly less painful experience :-D
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: AmigaHeretic on February 12, 2010, 02:27:14 AM
Quote from: Karlos;542640
Erm.... not as far as I know :lol:
Um, can you get work on it? ;-)
Seriously this is very awesome. Thanks for the hard work!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: AmigaHeretic on February 12, 2010, 02:29:20 AM
Quote from: Cammy;542772
Thanks for going to the effort to get Amiga.org looking better for us classic users, Karlos. The site works well through your proxy on my A1200, and I'll definitely start posting from here more often again from now on if the proxy stays up.
Awesome setup! Wish I still had my A1200 :(
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Rebel-CD32 on February 12, 2010, 05:19:48 AM
The site works well through the proxy on AWeb too. I was surprised with how well the page looked in AWeb until it Gurued the computer.
Thanks for doing this for us classic users, I use IBrowse on my A1200 all the time, it's still my main computer.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: bernd_afa on February 12, 2010, 08:03:12 AM
thats great, i think thats simular as the C++ parser transfer all to C and the compler compile C.
But for aweb is it maybe possible to put it as a pre parser that convert the CSS stuff to HTML that aweb understand ?
also its possible maybe to use for this the libcss from netsurf ? then maybe with the opensource aweb amiga have a fast CSS able browser.
I dont know, is there anybody working on aweb ?
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 12, 2010, 09:25:18 AM
Quote from: Cammy;542772
Thanks for going to the effort to get Amiga.org looking better for us classic users, Karlos. The site works well through your proxy on my A1200, and I'll definitely start posting from here more often again from now on if the proxy stays up.
The domain may be moving soon to a dedicated server, so there may be a bit of downtime in the meantime if that happens.
Quote
Are you planning on making it a subdomain of Amiga.org?
Once the proxy is more mature, I'll ask if that can be arranged. Ultimately, that would be up to the new owners.
Quote
I hope you don't mind me asking, but would it be possible to make the Quick Reply box show up so we don't need to load an extra page to reply? It's not a big deal, but it might help speed things up a little when posting.
For the moment, I removed it since I couldn't get the feature working properly in ibrowse in the first place, but I can look into it, even if I have to implement it differently. I can't really take on feature requests until I've hammered out the bugs and other issues of which there are still many.
Quote
Here's a photo of my A1200 running IBrowse, browsing Amiga.org through the proxy server. I'm posting this message from my A1200, too!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 12, 2010, 09:28:47 AM
Quote from: Rebel-CD32;542796
The site works well through the proxy on AWeb too. I was surprised with how well the page looked in AWeb until it Gurued the computer.
Thanks for doing this for us classic users, I use IBrowse on my A1200 all the time, it's still my main computer.
I found that a big problem is that none of the inlined images include width and height attributes. This tends to force aweb to continuously reflow the page as images are loaded, which can cause it to get it's knickers in a twist. Some of the images sizes can be inferred by inspecting any attached styles, but they are only a small subsection.
The only other way to find the size of an image is to use gd to inspect it, but that then means sending all images through the proxy as well and having it inspect them. That would dramatically increase the server load and bandwidth, so it's not realistically an option.
Title: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Drummerboy on February 14, 2010, 12:41:46 AM
Thanks men..
Work Great with the Fossil Browsers!!.. :-]
regards!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 19, 2010, 06:47:12 PM
Some minor updates:
1) Improved rendering in AWeb (only tested in APL Lite 3.5.09) 2) The CSS "your notification" popup has now been replaced with an option select list 3) The disclaimer text is now collapsable, saving some room. 4) Images that are output directly from session-independent php code (avatars and their various previews are a prime example) are now no longer routed via the proxy but taken directly from the site, which should speed up loading a bit. 5) Lots of miscellaneous minor fixes to layout. The front page actually scores better on the W3C markup validation test than the original.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: pVC on February 19, 2010, 06:50:58 PM
Thanks! So far I've been just reading with this and it's been better than official verison ;)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Gulliver on February 19, 2010, 07:11:16 PM
Great! It looks really good!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Tenacious on February 20, 2010, 11:42:13 PM
Excellent job Karlos!
I hope this progresses. No offense to Wayne, but, there really are many ppl logging in with Amigas. Any site for the Amiga community about Amiga computers should look great on an Amiga computer.
It's like coming home again. I'll try to participate more, now.
Thank You!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: miamiga on February 21, 2010, 12:50:07 PM
Great job Thank You!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on February 27, 2010, 10:36:01 PM
In a quirk of fate, the graphics card in my main machine has unexpectedly failed, meaning my main machine is, once again, my Amiga.
As a consequence of this, I'm having to post from IBrowse myself (Actually, I could use OWB, but IBrowse is a bit lighter)...
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on March 06, 2010, 07:32:19 PM
A slight update in response to analysing my server logs.
It seems a lot of folks were browsing the proxy using browsers that would be capable of viewing the mainsite with ease. I've added a redirect that automatically takes visitors to the mainsite if there is no indication that they are using an amigaos/aros/morphos based browser.
I've tested that it works with the spoofing options available in ibrowse but if anybody experiences any problems with other amiga browsers and spoofing, please let me know.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: tone007 on April 29, 2010, 04:42:15 AM
This message was posted using an A500 accessing Amiga.org through Karlos' awesome Amiga.org proxy!
Here's a photo of the experience:
(http://jungle.net/tone/500web.jpg)
edit: and my typo was corrected on a PC..
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on April 29, 2010, 09:14:52 AM
A500 surfing, FTW :)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on April 29, 2010, 09:16:51 AM
One thing that is pretty clear from looking at it is that some adaptations could be made for low resolution / low colour scenarios.
I'll have to think about that when I get time. The user profile view needs fixing still, it's totally borked compared to the regular CSS version.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Xanxi on April 29, 2010, 02:37:59 PM
Thank you Karlos for this work. I was indeed really depressed to get a crapy result with ibrowse on amiga.org pages.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on May 07, 2010, 02:24:47 PM
Quote from: Cammy;542772
I hope you don't mind me asking, but would it be possible to make the Quick Reply box show up so we don't need to load an extra page to reply? It's not a big deal, but it might help speed things up a little when posting.
Well, I couldn't get the "proper" quick reply function (that uses the text entry box at the bottom of the page) to work, but I have reworked it such that it works as a normal "reply with quote", rather like the old forum.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on May 14, 2010, 12:18:17 AM
After a long time away from this wee project, I finally got around to doing some work on the links section. Not finished, but it is slightly tidier. Not all of the popup menu -> option list type transformations are done yet, nor has the submit page been tested.
However, you can at least browse the links section now without getting this (http://aoproxy.extropia.co.uk/404.html) :lol:
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on May 16, 2010, 03:05:12 PM
I've finally gotten around to fixing a few issues, particularly several of those stubborn bits of layout that thanks to the lack of inherited CSS properties were showing the wrong colour font (black) when used on a dark background.
The regex involved is a bit lairy and I managed to get a few PCRE errors along the way. They should be stomped now, but if anybody encounters one, please let me know.
I've also added an experimental "small width" mode that tries to reduce the screen width requirements. This is primarily aimed at people using ibrowse/aweb on native modes. This reduces the banner size and rearranges the navigation option lists that the proxy puts in place of some of the original popup navigation menus into a second strip underneath the main navigation (see attached image).
To test this, use the following link (http://aoproxy.extropia.co.uk/?shd=1&sus=1)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Fingers on May 29, 2010, 11:11:39 AM
It's working better than ever!
Thanks so much for the hard work you've put into this!!!!
PZ.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: pVC on January 12, 2011, 05:37:35 PM
What's up with proxy? Doesn't seem to work here now:
You don't have permission to access / on this server.
Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 05:42:47 PM
Hi,
Looking into it now.
-edit-
All the files, directories and what not are still there and permissions seem OK. There has been some server maintenance going on with the hosting provider, I wonder if they've messed something up.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 06:32:10 PM
The proxy is fine, it's amiga.org that's giving the error message.
<!-- http://amiga.org/index.php : retrieved in 0.422s --> <!-- HeadIFrameEliminator:Bytes in: 469, out: 469, took 0.000 s DegradeXHTMLRewriter:Bytes in: 469, out: 543, took 0.000 s LinkRewriter:Bytes in: 543, out: 543, took 0.000 s MainNavigationRewriter:Bytes in: 543, out: 543, took 0.000 s CommonBlockRewriter:Bytes in: 543, out: 562, took 0.000 s CSSRewriter:Bytes in: 562, out: 562, took 0.000 s JavascriptRewriter:Bytes in: 562, out: 562, took 0.000 s FrontPageModulesRewriter:Bytes in: 562, out: 562, took 0.000 s --> <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> <html><head> <title>403 Forbidden [Old Browser Edition]</title> </head><body bgcolor="#ffffff"> <h1>Forbidden</h1> <p>You don't have permission to access /index.php on this server.</p> <p>Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.</p> <hr> <address>Apache mod_fcgid/2.3.5 FrontPage/5.0.2.2635 mod_bwlimited/1.4 mod_auth_passthrough/2.1 Server at amiga.org Port 80</address> </body></html>
<!-- http://amiga.org/index.php : processed in 0.001s --> The comments in that source are generated by the proxy. My guess is that amiga.org no longer likes my webserver reading content *sniff*
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: pVC on January 12, 2011, 07:13:46 PM
Hmh.. and what could be reason for that? I hope it gets solved or my amiga.org usage will drop down significantly :(
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 07:19:16 PM
Quote from: pVC;606248
Hmh.. and what could be reason for that? I hope it gets solved or my amiga.org usage will drop down significantly :(
At this moment, I don't know. It could be many things.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 07:41:38 PM
When did you first notice a problem?
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Xanxi on January 12, 2011, 08:24:37 PM
Quote from: Karlos;606259
When did you first notice a problem?
2 days ago.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 08:30:04 PM
Strange, the proxy logs look more or less normal until today. I'll have to get my pipe and deerstalker and get back to you on that one.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on January 12, 2011, 08:37:05 PM
The issue should now be fixed.
It seems the IP range covering my server was blocked. As the proxy had the blessing of the site owners, I can only assume this was an error and I've added an exception for the specific IP of the server.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: pVC on January 12, 2011, 09:09:23 PM
Yeah, works now, thanks! Issue was at least since yesterday...
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on April 10, 2011, 12:59:10 PM
I was reminded by Cammy's latest entry into the gallery that I'd added a size switcher to the proxy and forgotten to wire it into the user interface.
I've now added that feature along with one that attempts to store your whether or not you are using it and have hidden the disclaimer into a cookie on your local machine.
If you are using amiga.org via the proxy on a smaller screen size, try clicking the "640 wide screen?" link under the menu bar. It rearranges the menus and uses a smaller logo in an effort to improve the experience on older browsers.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Cammy on April 10, 2011, 10:58:11 PM
Thanks a bunch, Karlos! I have now switched to 640 mode on the A600 and it fits better. Would there be any way you could reduce the size of avatars by 50%? That would really help out too!
I've updated my screenshot to show the new 640 version, as well as plugging Dynamite because I get lonely on there with no one to battle!
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on April 10, 2011, 11:37:11 PM
I suppose the avatars could be reduced by forcing the image size, but that might render quite slowly in the browser as it would have to do the scaling itself.
Another option would be to pull them through the proxy and resample them on the fly. The downside of that is it would pretty much destroy any animated ones.
A final option might be to allow the hiding of avatars, but I guess that's doesn't seem as appealing.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Retrofan on April 11, 2011, 01:18:09 AM
Great, great, great!!! I`m browsing with my A1200/ACA56/Ibrowse and it`s really fantastic. I`ve substituted the old link. I`m using a 23" led Tv and I find great the size of avatars (Cammy`s better than Karlos`s one). I like a lot the white background. BTW Cammy where did you get that navigation toolbar? The size of the text can be bigger or is it something I can change in Ibrowse and I don`t know how? The AMIGA.org logo should be bigger too, I thik. EDIT: Have you changed it? Now looks right, logo and text.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: runequester on April 11, 2011, 03:24:28 AM
I've actually just been going to the normal site in Ibrowse. I guess I should check out the proxy huh :)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on April 11, 2011, 07:29:53 AM
Quote from: Retrofan;630847
Great, great, great!!! I`m browsing with my A1200/ACA56/Ibrowse and it`s really fantastic. I`ve substituted the old link. I`m using a 23" led Tv and I find great the size of avatars (Cammy`s better than Karlos`s one). I like a lot the white background. BTW Cammy where did you get that navigation toolbar? The size of the text can be bigger or is it something I can change in Ibrowse and I don`t know how?
The font size is something you can set in iBrowse's preferences. I don't have as much control over it as you might think - the original page is dependent on CSS for controlling such things whereas the proxy has to generate old-fashioned tags, an anathema to modern web standards to say the least. When I was putting it together and testing it, I found that it looked best for me as it does now. Your mileage may vary. One of the many reasons CSS exists is to help standardise the rendering of elements on a page.
Quote
The AMIGA.org logo should be bigger too, I thik. EDIT: Have you changed it? Now looks right, logo and text.
There are only two options. The regular logo, which you will see when you don't use the "640 wide" mode or a specially resized one (reproduced with permission from the current owners) should you decide to opt for the smaller screen size layout.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Retrofan on April 11, 2011, 09:26:01 AM
I changed it the first time, that was why the next time it was different. BTW I changed the Google search page in Ibrowse for Google.es and now it looks better, with the white background too that I hadn't. I have to see how do I change the size of letters, but now they look right. Thanks a lot.
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Crumb on May 09, 2011, 04:02:02 PM
@Karlos
do you think it would be possible to release the proxy as a local stand-alone program? It would be useful to access some webpages :-)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: nicholas on May 09, 2011, 04:11:45 PM
Quote from: Crumb;636734
@Karlos
do you think it would be possible to release the proxy as a local stand-alone program? It would be useful to access some webpages :-)
As I understand it it's specific to this site. Not to mention Karlos' bandwidth bill! ;)
Title: Re: Experimental IBrowse proxy for amiga.org
Post by: Karlos on May 09, 2011, 09:10:11 PM
Quote from: nicholas;636736
As I understand it it's specific to this site.
Well, it is, but it's also implemented in a fashion that would allow you to make it work for other sites, but not without having to write code. Essentially it's based around a wrapper for cURL to pull documents then a chain of "processors" all of which implement the following simple interface:
interface MarkupRewriter { public function process($content); }
The main controller, a singleton class called PageRequest has a default set of these that are needed on all of the amiga.org pages and allows you to add additional ones that are specific to only a few. So, in the stub "newreply.php" file, your code looks like this:
Although this is simple, the present incarnation requires that you have a stub .php file for every target page on the site you are proxying, which was fine in this case but not useful for a general purpose proxy. A better solution would be to use some rewrite rules and have a single page through which all requests are brokered, with some parameters added invisibly in the rewrite rule that instruct the PageRequest class to bind additional MarkupRewriter instances as required.
So, yes, you could use the code to make a more general proxy for other sites, but you would want to do it in a better fashion than I did for this one :)