## This is the README file for html2text          Wed Jan 14 14:35:57 CET 2004
## ===========================================================================

html2text is a command line utility, written in C++, that converts HTML
documents into plain text. It was written up to version 1.2.2 for and is
copyrighted by GMRS Software GmbH, Unterschleißheim.

html2text reads HTML documents from standard input or a (local or remote)
URI, and formats them into a stream of plain text characters that is written
to standard output or into an output-file, preserving the original positions
of table fields.

ISO 8859-1 is used for output by default, plain-ASCII output can be chosen by
setting the "-ascii" command line option. Type "html2text -help" for an
overview of all command line options.

Examples:
html2text <file> | less
html2text -o outfile.txt -ascii -nobs <file>

The rendering is largely customisable through the "html2textrc" file and the
"-style" command line option, that may be used to change quickly some
formatting defaults. See the html2textrc(5) manual page for details.

Although html2text was written for the conversion of HTML 3.2 documents, most
constructs of HTML 4 are renderred as well, including most SGML entities,
provided that they are written as "named entities" and not as a numeric value.
The program tries to parse even XHTML documents and the HTML produced by word
processors, but this not always as successful as other HTML parsers, because
html2text is, as already said, for all that an HTML 3.2 converter.

The program accepts also syntactically incorrect input, attempting to
interpret it "reasonably". If the output is however not satisfactory, of if
rendering fails completely, and you have the possibility to correct the HTML
source code, you may want to use the "-unparse" or "-check" options to find
out what exactly html2text's problem is.

This program was written because GMRS was looking for a good, free
HTML-to-text converter for UNIX, and they couldn't find one on the net. The
best they could find was lynx, i.e. "lynx -dump", but lynx could not cope with
tables.


# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# For information on compiling and installing the package on your system,
# please refer to the file INSTALL.

html2text was developed and is tested under Linux. However, it uses no
O/S-specific features and should be easily portable to other platforms (at
least to other UNIX-ish platforms). It is reported to compile and work on the
following platforms:

	+ AIX 4.3/g++ 2.95.1
	+ AIX 4.3.2.0/g++ 2.95.2.1
	+ CYGWIN_NT-5.0 1.5.4/gcc 3.2
	+ FreeBSD 5.1/gcc 3.2.1
	+ IRIX64 6.5/MIPS 7.41
	+ Linux 2.2.18/g++ 2.95.2
	+ Linux 2.4.16/g++ 2.95.3
	+ Linux 2.4.22/gcc 3.3.2
	+ NetBSD 1.6.1/gcc 2.95
	+ SINIX/CDS++ 2.0A00

You will find some hints for porting it to other platforms at the end of the
file "INSTALL".

Note for version 1.3.2(a): Version 1.3.2 is distributed in two "flavours":
1.3.2A contains changes needed for g++ 3.3 and later, which are not
backwards-compatible. Thus, if you use an older (or other) compiler, please
use version 1.3.2 (without 'a'), if you have g++ 3.3 (and up) installed,
please use version 1.3.2A. Cross-patches (from 1.3.2 to 1.3.2a and viceversa)
are included into the source code packages of either flavours.


# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Published under the terms of the GNU General Public License.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more
details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with
this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple
Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.


# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# GMRS agreed to change the program's license terms to GPL.

Message-ID: <01c401c10f72$d11c3660$12c8a8c0@jag>
Reply-To: "David Geffen" <geffen@one4net.com>
From: "David Geffen" <david@one4net.com>
To: <mbayer@zedat.fu-berlin.de>
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2001 12:17:14 +0200
Organization: GMRS Software GmbH

Hallo Herr Bayer,

html2text darf unter die GPL veroeffentlicht werden, solange one4net keinerlei
Nachteile oder Verpflichtungen dadurch entstehen.

Mit freundlichen Gruessen
David Geffen


----- Original Message -----
From: "Martin Bayer" <mbayer@zedat.fu-berlin.de>
To: <geffen@one4net.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2001 5:39 PM
Subject: Re: Lizenzbedingungen von 'html2text'


> Guten Tag!
>
> On Mon, Jun 25, 2001 at 03:23:31PM +0200, David Geffen wrote:
> > > Aus diesem Grunde möchte ich Sie herzlich bitten, zu überlegen, ob es
> > > für GMRS nicht möglich wäre, 'html2text' nachträglich unter die GPL zu
> > > stellen.
> >
> > ich bin erst heute zurueck aus dem Urlaub gekommen.
> >
> > Ich werde mich in den naechsten paar Tage dazu melden.
>
> Darf ich Sie fragen, ob Sie in dieser Angelegenheit bereits zu einem
> Entschluss gekommen sind? Es ist mittlerweile gelungen, das Programm nach
> g++3 zu portieren, und da wäre es schön, wenn bereits diese neue Version
> unter GPL veröffentlicht werden könne.
>
> Mit den besten Grüßen
> --
> Martin Bayer
>                                                 c.ne Ostiense, 212/E/15
> E-Mail: mail@mbayer.de                          I-00154 Roma
> WWW: http://www.mbayer.de                       GSM: +39 3476605285


# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# This program is not provided nor supported by GMRS any longer.

Since GMRS decided not to develop nor to support this program any longer,
they also did not provide its source code any more. With this, I realised,
the source code of this program was hardly to obtain, as most archives
included at best a precompiled version. Because I liked the features, I
offered a webspace where this program now is living at,

	http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~mbayer/tools/html2text.html

I'm afraid in this way I've become the maintainer of this package, even if I
actually don't have time free to spend on working on the program by myself.
Please keep this in mind if you are going to write me. :-)

The source code can also be obtained from the Ibiblio network at

	[ftp|http]://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/apps/www/converters/

If you are going to retrieve the source code from within automated scripts,
e.g. by a software packaging manager, please prefer downloading it from the
Ibiblio server or one of its mirrors.


# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# »We accept patches.«

Please include in all your messages information on
	· the version of html2text you are referring to (`html2text -version`),
          if you obtained the program in binary form, the version number as
	  supplied by your package manager (e.g. `rpm -q html2text`);
	· name and version of your operating system (`uname -a`);
	· name and version of your compiler (`cc -v`).

If you think you found a possible security impact, please let _me_ know
_first_.

If you think you found a bug, please try first to find out its possible
reason by yourself, using the "-unparse", "-check", "-debug-scanner", and
"-debug-parser" command line options, in order to save other people's time. I
will not consider any "bug report" that just claims "your program is
buggy!!!!!1", nor will I answer to any mail asking me O/S-specific questions.

I will include into the TODO list any sensible feature request.

And, last but not least, patches are always very welcome. :-)


Martin Bayer <mbayer@zedat.fu-berlin.de>

	For all e-mails, use of PGP (GPG) is encouraged. You will find my
	public key (ID: 0xCB537B60) on my homepage and on keyservers. The key's
	fingerprint is: "46A1 B556 41CD C77A 0261  D22F 41A6 EB90 CB53 7B60".
