Installing the Lynx Text-mode Browser

If you're interested in trying out surfing the web with your teletype machine, you also need to download and install a copy of Lynx, a text-mode browser developed at the University of Kansas (my alma mater!).

Windows

Although Lynx is mostly used on Linux and Unix systems, several Windows ports exists.  The one I've had good luck with can be found at FDISK.COM.  Go there and download the most recent stable version for Win32.  As of 4/7/2001, it was this one.

Once you download the file, unzip it.  Then create a new folder on your C: drive named "lynx".  Move the contents of the unzipped file into the new C:\lynx folder.  After doing this, open the C:\lynx folder.  You should see something like the following:

Volume in drive C has no label
Volume Serial Number is 1044-19EA
Directory of C:\lynx

. <DIR> 04-05-01 6:51p .
.. <DIR> 04-05-01 6:51p ..
LYNX CFG 97,203 05-31-99 8:16a lynx.cfg
LYNX EXE 1,079,986 06-14-99 10:12p lynx.exe
CP EXE 31,744 11-03-95 8:00a CP.EXE
MV EXE 30,720 11-03-95 8:00a MV.EXE
SENDMAIL EXE 38,400 02-28-97 6:18p SENDMAIL.EXE
SENDMAIL TXT 1,544 03-14-97 10:10p SENDMAIL.TXT
README TXT 2,744 03-18-98 9:14p readme.txt
COPYING 18,423 03-14-97 10:13p COPYING
HELPER TXT 553 03-02-97 11:17p HELPER.TXT
ICON <DIR> 04-05-01 6:51p icon
HELP <DIR> 04-05-01 6:51p help
SAMPLES <DIR> 04-05-01 6:51p samples
COOKIES 95 04-05-01 8:27p cookies
10 file(s) 1,301,412 bytes
5 dir(s) 349,704,192 bytes free

Finally, create a new file named "lynx.bat" and copy into the following lines:

@ECHO OFF
set term=vt100
set home=c:\lynx
set temp=c:\tmp
set lynx_cfg=c:\lynx\lynx.cfg
c:\lynx\lynx.exe %1 %2 %3 %4 %5

Move the lynx.bat file into the C:\Windows directory and reboot. To verify that things worked out, open up a MS-DOS window and type:

lynx -version

If all went well, lynx should tell you which version it is.  Because Windows is brain-dead, you will probably run into a problem reported as something like "out of environment space."  

For Windows 95 & 98, the solution to this problem is to add the following line to your c:\config.sys file:

SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /E:1024 /P

For Windows ME (which doesn't use config.sys in the same manner as Win95/98), see the following Microsoft support bulletin:

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q261/8/25.ASP

Linux

If you're running Linux, chances are good that you already have Lynx installed.  Try:

lynx -version

to see.  If not, it's probably somewhere on your distribution CDs.  Otherwise, you can get an RPM at Red Hat, or just head to the source at http://lynx.browser.org.

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