[gopher] Adding TLS and/or SSL support to Gopher

[Kevin Veroneau]

I can help out with creating a client and server proxy for this.  However I'm not sure how this will work.  Here are my key concerns:

The Gopher protocol doesn't natively support proxy servers.  So, connecting to localhost can only tunnel to a single remote gopher server...
Rewritting of gopher menus to change both the host and port will also be needed.

As a result, I don't think creating a TLS proxy would be feasible, let alone tunneling through an SSH or SSL tunnel.

The major issue with the gopher protocol is it's menus provide a host and port.  While this is also a huge benefit to the protocol, it's also a hurdle when it comes to proxying the protocol itself.  Thankfully the menus are easily parsable.

On April 23, 2015 3:00:27 PM MDT, James Mills <prologic at shortcircuit.net.au> wrote:
>I actually quite like this idea to start with :)
>
>cheers
>James
>
>
>James Mills / prologic
>
>E: prologic at shortcircuit.net.au
>W: prologic.shortcircuit.net.au
>
>On Fri, Apr 24, 2015 at 5:18 AM, <simple at sdf.org> wrote:
>
>> New thread for an important topic :)
>>
>> Looking in my OS's /etc/services file it appears there are several
>> available ports in the 700-799 range:
>>
>> #                   703               Unassigned
>> #                   708               Unassigned
>> #                 717-728             Unassigned
>> #                   703               Unassigned
>> #                   708               Unassigned
>> #                 717-728             Unassigned
>> #                 732-740             Unassigned
>> #                   743               Unassigned
>> #                 745-746             Unassigned
>> #                 755-756             Unassigned
>> #                   766               Unassigned
>> #                   768               Unassigned
>> #                 778-779             Unassigned
>> #                 781-785             Unassigned
>> #                   786               Unassigned
>> #                   787               Unassigned
>> #                 788-799             Unassigned
>>
>> As for implementation of the concept, I feel it should be done in a
>way
>> that doesn't shut out existing gopher clients/servers.
>>
>> Perhaps adopting some sort of external client+server proxy model
>would be
>> the best starting point such that, for example, someone with a
>lynx(1)
>> browser could install a "secure_gopher" proxy on their computer such
>that
>> their now local port 70 requests are SSL-wrapped and sent on to a
>> corresponding "secure_gopher" proxy server listening on the new
>gopherS
>> TLS encrypted port (785 maybe?). Probably it's already doable using
>> opensshd and SOCKS, just need to pick a port.
>>
>> The above approach would not preclude others from basically
>incorporating
>> the proxy model into their new clients and servers for an all-in-one
>> solution.
>>
>> For making it officially part of Gopher World I think it means a new
>RFC
>> for "secure gopher" or at least adding the spec to the existing
>gopher
>> RFC; I don't know which would be easier.
>>
>> Jeff / gopher://jgw.mdns.org
>>
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>
>
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