Chapter 11: CGI Application Modules for CPAN

Chapter 11 - CGI Application Modules for CPAN
by?Sam Tregar?
Apress ? 2002
Companion Web Site

Overview

COMMON GATEWAY INTERFACE (CGI) programming is probably the most common use for the Perl language. CGI provides the interactivity in nearly every popular site on the Web today. Although CGI is an old technology by Internet standards, what it lacks in sex appeal it more than makes up for in utility and portability. Unlike the many CGI-replacement technologies available, it is supported on virtually every platform and Web server. If you can use Perl on your platform of choice, the chances are excellent that you can use CGI too.

CGI::Application^[1] provides a new and better way to build CGI programs as reusable modules. Since CGI::Application modules are normal Perl modules, they can be released on CPAN and reused by the Perl community. This chapter will introduce you to CGI::Application and explore the ways in which it encourages software reuse.

One thing this chapter won't do is teach you CGI programming or explain how to use CGI.pm. To get the most out of this chapter, you'll need some prior experience with CGI. If you're new to the technology, then you should consider reading a good book on the topic first.^[2]

^[1]Written by Jesse Erlbaum, the technical editor for this book. You can find it on CPAN, of course!

^[2]There are many books written about this subject. A favorite of mine is CGI Programming with Perl, 2nd Edition by Guelich, Gundavaram, and Birznieks (O'Reilly & Associates).