A type of Internet service first floated around
1991 and obsolesced around 1995 by the World Wide Web. Gopher
presents a menuing interface to a tree or graph of links;
the links can be to documents, runnable programs, or other gopher
menus arbitrarily far across the net.
Some claim that the gopher software, which was originally developed
at the University of Minnesota, was named after the Minnesota
Gophers (a sports team). Others claim the word derives from
American slang `gofer' (from "go for", dialectal "go fer"),
one whose job is to run and fetch things. Finally, observe that
gophers dig long tunnels, and the idea of tunneling through the net
to find information was a defining metaphor for the developers.
Probably all three things were true, but with the first two coming
first and the gopher-tunnel metaphor serendipitously adding flavor
and impetus to the project as it developed out of its concept
stage.
