Links (web browser)

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Categories: POSIX web browsers | Mac OS X web browsers | Text-based web browsers | Free web browsers | Web browsers for Plan 9

Not to be confused with Lynx (web browser).

Links
Screenshot screenshot
Developed by	?
Initial release	?
Stable release	2.0 (June 10, 2002) _[+/−]
Preview release	2.1pre33 (December 25, 2007) _[+/−]
Written in	C
OS	Unix, Linux, Windows
Available in	?
Genre	Web browser
License	GPL
Website	links.sourceforge.net

Links is an open source text and graphic web browser with a pull-down menu system. It renders complex pages (partial HTML 4.0 support including tables and frames, support for multiple character sets, including UTF-8), supports color and monochrome terminals and allows horizontal scrolling.

It is oriented toward visual users who want to retain many typical elements of graphical user interfaces (pop up windows, menus etc.) in a text-only environment. The focus on intuitive usability makes it suitable as a web browser for low-end terminals in libraries, Internet cafes etc.

The original version of Links was developed by Mikuláš Patočka in the Czech Republic. His group, Twibright Labs, later developed version 2 of the Links browser, that displays graphics [links -g], renders fonts in different sizes (with anti-aliasing) and supports JavaScript. The resulting browser is very fast, but it does not display many pages as they were intended. The graphical mode works even on Unix systems without X or any other window environment, using either SVGALib or the framebuffer of the system's graphics card.

1 Elinks
2 Links Hacked
3 See also
4 External links
5 References

Elinks

Main article: ELinks

ELinks ("Experimental/Enhanced Links") is a fork led by Petr Baudis. It is based on Links 0.9. It has a more open development and incorporates patches from other Links versions (such as additional extension scripting in Lua) and from Internet users.

Links Hacked

Links Hacked is another version of the Links browser which has merged some of Elinks' features into Links 2.

Andrey Mirtchovski has ported it to Plan 9. It is considered a good browser on that operating system, though some users have griped about its inability to cut and paste with the Plan 9 snarf buffer.

Evolt has hosted an unsupported version on its archive for 32 bit Windows.