For you tech junkies, Perl 5 is an interpreted language basically meaning that every time that a Perl script is called, the Perl interpreter reads the Perl script and executes the script. This means that interpreters can be made for different types of machines, but the Perl script does not have to change generally (some interpreters do not implement the functions in the same manner as other interpreters do causing some problems). 

In comparison, C++ scripts are compiled for each specific machine. Compiled C++ code is mainly faster because when the C++ script is compiled, the script is translated to code that the specific machine understands. C++ scripts are sometimes harder to setup without the actual source code though and any modifications you need to be made will require the script's source code. 

There are many different advantages and disadvantages when using either Perl or C++ scripts.

Some people call scripts based on their language that they use. Perl scripts are scripts that are programmed in Perl for example. CGI scripts refer to any script that uses CGI. Perl scripts and C++ scripts do not have to use CGI, but most that are running on web servers do use CGI to some extent. You can think of CGI scripts being a general term while Perl and C++ scripts as more specific identifiers.

Custom programming is available by quotation from NovaTech Web Services.

Cold Fusion by Allaire is another server side technology. It is basically more like a database server technology that has special markup code like ASP, but Cold Fusion can do many more different tasks. Unfortunately, teaching Cold Fusion is beyond the scope of these support documents. NovaTech Web Services can support Cold Fusion, but there may be a small fee. Please see NovaTech Rate Plans for more details. 

FTP programs such as CuteFTP or WS_FTP (available at your local shareware file archive) should automatically upload scripts in ASCII format. If they do not automatically upload in ASCII format, set the text files extension to include .pl and .cgi files. View your program's help file for more information.

If you need a feedback form mailer, please check out what is currently available on the scripts page.

If you do not know what your CGI script does, do not run it.  Malicious scripts are sometimes found on the web. Do not run any script or upload any script that you believe contains malicious code. If you are not sure, post a message to the WebBoard and the source code of the script. Any script that creates, modifies, or deletes directories and files is potentially dangerous. There are security measures in place, but this is a general warning for all scripts.

drive letter:\users\username\username.com\ 
\htdocs 
\cgi-shl 
\cgi-shl-prot 
\cgi-dos 
\cgi-win 
\cgi-src 

Replace "drive letter" and "username" with the drive that you are on and the username that you have been given. The username is generally the same as your domain name. 

That's a lot of directories. What directory should you place CGI scripts in? Generally, place all CGI scripts in your \cgi-shl directory. It is advisable to make directories for each script to separate individual scripts. 

Placing files in \cgi-shl-prot will be more secure and protected meaning that users will not be able to grab the script source and data files, but they can still run the CGI script. 

The other directories are for specific programs. You should not use them unless you know a script that specifically requires one of the directories above. 

You cannot run scripts outside your CGI-BIN directories. Also, on another note, anything placed inside the cgi-bin directories must be either a data file or an executable CGI script. They cannot be HTML files. You need to place your HTML files inside your \htdocs directory and separate your CGI script from the HTML files that use the CGI script.

e:\users\foo\foo.com\cgi-shl\formmail\formmail.pl 

Now, to call this CGI script, you will need to call it from the following URL: 

http://www.foo.com/cgi-shl/formmail/formmail.pl 

This works for every cgi-bin directory.

SSI is useful in many different ways. Suppose you need a menubar on a set of 100 pages, and you do not want to have to go through every page to update every time that menu bar changes. Server side includes can be used for that task (the #include command specifically). 

Or, suppose that you want a time date like when the last time your page was modified to be included on a page. You can use SSI for that (#lastmod). 

And finally, another common use is for those that want to include inline CGI scripts like counters, so instead of having your page run through a CGI script every time causing massive memory resource consumption, you can place a call to a CGI script that just returns the counter number for text based counters or HTML code for a graphical counter which causes less memory consumption.

HTML files have higher precedance than SHTML files. For those that use index.html files so that users can browse directories such as http://www.foo.com/ or http://www.foo.com/dir/, and they do not see the index.html or index.htm file, this is a general warning. If you use SHTML files particularly index.shtml or index.shtm, then make sure there is not an index.html or index.htm file in the same directory. The index.html file will always be loaded instead of the index.shtml file if it exists.There are several SSI commands available for your use. There are no restrictions in place. Here is a list of the more common ones, examples, and applicable uses. 

The basic SSI tag is below: 

<!--#<tag> <variable set>--> 

<!--#include virtual="/path/to/file"--> 
This is perhaps the most common SSI command. It is used to include files obivously. 

The menubar to the left uses the include path. The original menu bar file is located at http://www.NovaTech.net/support/scripts/menubar.html. The SSI code is the following: 

<!--#include virtual="/support/script/menubar.html"--> 
 

You must base the /path/to directory starting from your htdocs directory. For example, suppose that your domain name is foo.com at http://www.foo.com/. Now, you want to include a file at http://www.foo.com/menu/test.txt. From any SHTML file you can paste the following SSI code, and the file test.txt will be included. 

<!--#include virtual="/menu/test.txt"--> 
 

The file to be included must not contain the extension .shtml or .shtm which is a safety measure (think of the problems when the original .shtml file (file X) includes another file (file A) which has a call to the original .shtml file (file X)). It protects from infinite loops such as the one described. You can name the file to be included any file name you want with any extension except .shtml or .shtm. 

<!--#flastmod virtual="index.shtml"--> 

This SSI command gives you the last date and time that the file specified in the file variable was modified. This command must be given within the same directory or within a "super"-directory. 

Here is the last date that this index.shtml file was modified: 

The SSI code used is the following: 

<!--#flastmod virtual="/support/scripts/basics/index.shtml"--> 

You might find this useful on news pages at the top of your page or as a regular footer so that visitors can find out the last date that your page was modified. 

<!--#exec cgi="/cgi-shl/script.pl"--> 

This SSI command is for SSI-enabled CGI scripts. You must start with /cgi-shl/ for the directory. 

<!--#exec cgi="/cgi-shl/counter/counter.pl"--> 

The above is an example of how you can call an SSI textcounter script. It should return with a number that will print with your content.