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In this thread I was suggested to do an action with lynx or pandoc.

To my understanding, both programs can output an all backend and solely or primarily textual webpage, in console, pretty much as this webpage would be rendered on a web browser.

I googled "lynx pandoc diff" (without quote marks) but didn't find a succinct explanation about the difference between the two programs.

What is the difference between lynx and pandoc?

Update

I should have read a bit, an intro at least, about these utilities in man before publishing this question but due to not doing so and losing time in comments together with another user I do it symbolically to punish myself, better late than never as the principle goes.

I have found after executing man pandoc:

pandoc - general markup converter

Pandoc is a Haskell library for converting from one markup format to another, and a command-line tool that uses this library. It can read Markdown, CommonMark, PHP Markdown Extra, GitHub-Flavored Markdown, MultiMark‐ down, and (subsets of) Textile, reStructuredText, HTML, LaTeX, MediaWiki markup, TWiki markup, Haddock markup, OPML, Emacs Org mode, DocBook, txt2tags, EPUB, ODT and Word docx; and it can write plain text.

I have found after executing man lynx:

lynx - a general purpose distributed information browser for the World Wide Web

Lynx is a fully-featured World Wide Web (WWW) client for users running cursor-addressable, character-cell display devices (e.g., vt100 terminals, vt100 emulators running on Windows 95/NT/XP/7/8 or any POSIX platform, or any other “curses-oriented” display). It will display hypertext markup language (HTML) documents containing links to files residing on the local system, as well as files residing on remote systems running Gopher, HTTP, FTP, WAIS, and NNTP servers. Current versions of Lynx run on Unix, VMS, Windows 95/NT/XP/7/8, DOS DJGPP and OS/2.

Lynx can be used to access information on the World Wide Web, or to build information systems intended primarily for local access. For example, Lynx has been used to build several Campus Wide Information Systems (CWIS). In addition, Lynx can be used to build systems isolated within a single LAN.

I am anyway happy with publishing this question because if someone not familiar with the man culture or websites describing the utilities and stuck and feel overwhelmed, this post might help this person.

Lahor
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  • Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been [moved to chat](https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/134787/discussion-on-question-by-lahor-what-is-the-essential-difference-between-lynx-an). – terdon Mar 15 '22 at 12:50

1 Answers1

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Lynx is a browser. Interactive application which you can use to browse the web, minus graphics.

Pandoc is a converter. It takes a file in one format and converts into another.

White Owl
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  • Wouldn't you say that pandoc is also a browser in the sense that it can accesses and somewhat "render" webpages? Thanks, – Lahor Mar 14 '22 at 15:45
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    While both can download html using http(s) and convert it to plain text, the similarities more or less end there. You can't use pandoc interactively, as @white-owl points out. Pandoc can, however, convert lots of other file formats, and output lots of other file formats, which lynx wasn't designed to do. – frabjous Mar 14 '22 at 15:52
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    @Lahor lynx is a web browser, that does all the things web browsers do: accesses remote pages, displays them, and lets you fill out forms, etc. pandoc is a file format converter and does none of the things that a browser does. they are completely unrelated aside from the fact that both have the ability to parse html and render it to plain text – Fox Mar 14 '22 at 17:00
  • @Fox I think what you wrote should be an answer, especially `they are completely unrelated aside from the fact that both have the ability to parse html and render it to plain text`. – Lahor Mar 14 '22 at 17:03