How to Install a CGI Script and Increase Web Site Interactivity

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You may have delayed cgi script ...
due ... complex process.
Well, I avoided it also ... years, however if you want to increase your ...
... it's a ...
You may have delayed cgi script installation due theapparently complex process. Well, I avoided it also forseveral years, however if you want to increase your website's interactivity it's a necessity to know how to do it.It's not hard to learn and you don't have to be aprogrammer.What is CGI ?Common Gateway Interface or CGI is a program that caninteract with an html form on your web site, and processesthe results on your server using a cgi script.
The resultgenerated is a dynamic web page. The cgi script is writtenin a language called PERL ("practical extraction andreporting language").Uses of CGI scriptsCGI scripts are most commonly used for creating userinteraction with a html form on your web site.
Other usesinclude: autoresponders, shopping carts, counters, mailinglist managers, ad management, surveys, polls, discussionboards, content management, calendars and click tracking.There are 100s of free cgi scripts that can be found on theNet. Just do a search on Google for "free cgi scripts" orvisit the resources at the end of this article.We will create an html email form to collect the name,email address and comments of subscribers using a securecgi formmail script.
An automatic confirmation will be sentand the results of the email form will be passed on to youremail address.Steps to installing your own cgi script1. Check that your web host supports CGI - your web hostwill have a cgi-bin folder installed on the server.
Thecgi-bin is a special directory in the server where all thefiles which require security are kept. This is where youwill upload your cgi script once it has been modified.2.
Download the cgi script - this is a secure cgi formmailscript. Spammers can't access and harvest your emailaddress from this script.http://nms-cgi.sourceforge.net/formmail.zip3.
Read the documentation that comes with the script - thiswill give you a thorough understanding what changes youneed to make to have it work correctly with your web siteand server. It will also provide you with some examples.Editing your script4.
Open and edit your cgi script using notepad (don't usean html editor as this can create errors).5. Remove the html tags from the script (at the top andbottom).6.
Change the path to perl to: #!/usr/bin/perl -wT (this isthe first line of the script to be edited).7. The section of the cgi script shown below, are the otherminimum fields to fill out in the script (replace thefields in the script you downloaded with the changed fieldsin the script below).# USER CONFIGURATION SECTION# --------------------------# Modify these to your own settings.
You might have to# contact your system administrator if you do not run# your own web server. If the purpose of these# parameters seems unclear, please see the README file.#BEGIN{ $DEBUGGING = 1; $emulate_matts_code= 0; $secure = 1; $allow_empty_ref = 1; $max_recipients = 1; $mailprog = '/usr/lib/sendmail -oi -t'; $postmaster = '[email protected]'; @referers = qw(yourdomain.com); @allow_mail_to = qw(); @recipients = (); %recipient_alias = ('siteowner' => '[email protected]',); @valid_ENV = qw(REMOTE_HOST REMOTE_ADDR REMOTE_USER HTTP_USER_AGENT); $locale = ''; $charset = 'iso-8859-1'; $date_fmt = '%A, %B %d, %Y at %H:%M:%S'; $style = ''; $no_content = 0; $double_spacing = 1; $wrap_text = 0; $wrap_style = 1; $send_confirmation_mail = 0; $confirmation_text = From: [email protected]: Subject of Your Contact Form(short note here->> )Thank you for your interest.
We will respond shortly.END_OF_CONFIRMATION## USER CONFIGURATION ># ----------------------------# (no user serviceable parts beyond here)--------------------------------------------------------------------------------$postmaster = Who's sending the email@referrers = Domains that are allowed to host the script%recipient_alias = Whom the script will send email toIn my form: Article Tags: Html Form, Html Email Source: Free Articles from ArticlesFactory.com .