Android app will allow you to browse the web without an internet connection, using SMS instead
In emerging markets where an internet connection can sometimes be hard to find, the Cosmos Browser for Android will be a Godsend. This app will allow you to browse the web without having connection to an internet pipeline. Simply punch in the URL, and the app uses SMS to send you a text-only, image free version of the website that you requested.
To keep costs down, you need to have have an unlimited text plan. Also, keep in mind that receiving websites via SMS is still going to be a slow process regardless of how barebones the results are.
Cosmos is expected to launch before the end of September and is actually quite a fascinating way of getting information into the hands of those who just do not have the infrastructure in place to maintain an internet connection. And while images are a no-no for now as we mentioned, the developers behind the app are working on a way to include images in future versions of Cosmos.
source: GitHub,fastcolabs via Engadget
To keep costs down, you need to have have an unlimited text plan. Also, keep in mind that receiving websites via SMS is still going to be a slow process regardless of how barebones the results are.
"After a person inputs a url, our app texts our Twilio number which forwards the URL as a POST request to our Node.JS backend. The backend takes the url, gets the HTML source of the website, minifies it, gets rid of the css, Javascript, and images, GZIP compresses it, encodes it in Base64, and sends the data as a series of SMS's. The phone receives this stream at a rate of 3 messages per second, orders them, decompresses them, and displays the content"-Cosmos
Cosmos is expected to launch before the end of September and is actually quite a fascinating way of getting information into the hands of those who just do not have the infrastructure in place to maintain an internet connection. And while images are a no-no for now as we mentioned, the developers behind the app are working on a way to include images in future versions of Cosmos.
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