Lynx (web browser)

Lynx is a text-only web browser for use on cursor-addressable, character cell computer terminal.

Browsing in Lynx consists of highlighting the chosen link using cursor keys, or having all links on a page numbered and entering the chosen link s number. Current versions support Secure Sockets Layer and many HTML features. Tables are linearized (scrunched together one cell after another without tabular structure), while frames are identified by name and can be explored as if they were separate pages.

Lynx is a product of the Distributed Computing Group within Academic Computing Services of the University of Kansas and was originally developed by Lou Montulli, Michael Grobe and Charles Rezac. Garrett Blythe created DosLynx and later joined the Lynx effort as well. Foteos Macrides ported much of Lynx to OpenVMS and maintained it for a time. In 1995, Lynx was released under the GNU General Public License, and is now maintained by a group of volunteers.

Lynx was originally designed for Unix and VMS and remains the most popular console browser on GNU/Linux. Versions are also available for DOS, and recent versions run on all Microsoft Windows releases. There is also a Macintosh version called MacLynx for System 7 and later , but it is not regularly updated.

Because of its text-to-speech-friendly interface, Lynx was once popular with visually-impaired users, but better screen readers have reduced the appeal of Lynx for this application.

Its primary competitors are the web browsers Links (web browser) (with variants Links2 and ELinks) and W3m.

=See also=

*Computer accessibility *List of web browsers *Comparison of web browsers

=References=

*[http://foldoc.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgiLynx Lynx]. Free On-line Dictionary of Computing .

=External links=

*[http://lynx.isc.org/ Lynx homepage] *[http://www.ku.edu/~grobe/early-lynx.html Michael Grobe s personal recollections of Lynx development] *[http://linux4u.jinr.ru/usoft/WWW/www_crl.com/subir/lynx.html Extremely Lynx resource page] *[http://ccadams.org/se/lynx.html MacLynx] *[http://csant.info/lynx Lynx for Windows installer]