Bodem is a simple Gopher server in rust.
I really like how radically simple the Gopher protocol is. This feature is even more appealing to me today, since these days even a 'simple' web page probably involves a ton of moving parts (e.g. let's encrypt integration, keeping track of vulnerabilities in your dependencies, etc.).
To give you an example of how simple the Gopher protocol really is, here is an example of using netcat to download a file over Gopher:
echo music/never_gonna_give_you_up.mp4 | nc gopher.example.com 70 > rickroll.mp4I would encourage everyone to read the Gopher RFC 1436 and/or wikipedia entry, if only for an interesting piece of history.
Also, COVID-19 has me quarantined and I wanted to do some nerding :)
Bodem only has a few configuration options, which you can see in the table below. Basically, you tell it what directory to serve and what port to listen on. Because the gopher protocol has no concept of relative links, bodem also needs to know what address clients can connect to in order to construct working links.
| short | long | env | default | description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
-l |
--listen |
BODEM_LISTEN |
127.0.0.1:7070 | Address to listen on, in the form :. |
BODEM_ROOT |
$PWD |
Directory to serve. | ||
--port |
BODEM_EXTERNAL_PORT |
7070 | External port that clients can connect to. Used to construct links. | |
--host |
BODEM_EXTERNAL_HOST |
localhost | External hostname that clients can connect to. Used to construct links. | |
-h |
--help |
Print a help message and quit. |
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
bodem -l 0.0.0.0:70 --host gopher.example.com |
Serve the current directory on port 70 (the official gopher port) on all interfaces. |
bodem /srv/gopher |
Serve the directory /srv/gopher on the default address (127.0.0.1:7070). |
bodem -l 172.16.11.135:1234 --host gopher.internal.example.com --port 1234 /some/stuff |
Serve the directory /some/stuff on 172.16.11.135:1234 (This of course will only work if you have an interface with this IP address configured). |
To build bodem, you'll need Rust and Cargo installed, for which I'll refer to the official documentation, but don't forget to check your local package manager.
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
cargo build --release |
Build a non-debug binary to target/release/bodem. |
cargo run |
Run a debug build directly. |
cargo run --release |
Run a non-debug build directly. |
Because Gopher is so simple, you might actually not need a client (as
demonstrated in the netcat example above). Having said that, it's still a
whole lot nicer to use with a proper client. Wikipedia has a list of clients,
but just to get started I'd recommend lynx. Just make sure you prepend the URL
with gopher:// (e.g. lynx gopher://localhost:7070) or lynx will default to
HTTP.
You're free to use, modify and distribute this software under the terms of the MIT license.