CGI Web Hosting - 3 Essential Scripts for your
Business
If there's one thing that people love it is a web site that has
plenty of automated features. Sites that are highly interactive
tend to get the most traffic and generate the most business for
the companies that run them. Automated features can also play a
"behind the scenes" role, making your site easier to use, run
smoothly and allow for things like online sales and password
protection. There are many ways to get this type of automation
into your site, but all involve either client side or server
side scripting.
Scripts are written in programming languages specially designed
for the web, and there are several languages that are commonly
used. Most client side scripts are written in Java which is
still one of the best web programming languages around. Some
functions of a web site must be completed via server side
scripting, however, and the most commonly used languages for
server side scripting are PHP, PERL, and CGI. PHP and PERL are
newer languages and are gaining a lot of popularity, but there
are still plenty of features that can be scripted in the
granddaddy of web scripting languages, CGI.
Shopping Carts
No online sales site would be complete without a functioning
shopping cart and most of the best ones have been written in CGI
script. CGI web hosting is great for shopping cart scripts
because it interfaces well with most databases, including the
popular MYSQL and MS Access databases, it can be utilized on
Windows, UNIX, LINUX, and MACOS servers with equal ease, and can
be easily configured for sales tax and shipping cost
calculations. Some newer shopping cart scripts are being written
in PHP and PERL, but most of the functioning carts on the web are
in good old CGI web hosting scripts.
Password Protection
Many web sites require some sort of registration and entry of a
password for the user to access the site's features. This is
done for a number of reasons from simply a desire to track
visitors for marketing purposes to allowing postings on message
boards and ensuring that users have paid any required fees
associated with use of the site. The automated registration
process and user name/password issuance can be written with CGI
scripts and many of them have been.
Form Managers
Have you ever wondered how the forms you fill out online are
handled? In most cases, they're handled by CGI web hosting.
When a user fills in that form and hits the "submit" button, a
CGI script takes over and sends the data in email or writes it
to a database where it can be accessed later by the site's
administrators.
These are just a few of the uses for CGI scripts on today's web
sites. There are literally hundreds of others and if there's
something that can be done on a web site, it is something that
can be done with CGI. PHP and PERL may be gaining a lot of
popularity for various reasons, but CGI was with us first and it
isn't going anywhere. As long as there are web sites, CGI web
hosting will remain king.
John Michaels is a freelance author for
http://www.webhostpacks .
com/ where he regularly publishes internet related articles
including: http://www.webhostpacks.com/low-cost-web-hosting-
services.html
<< ------------------End of Article --------------- >>
Find More Information Articles
See Also:
All Articles
About Computers & Web Pages
Index of All
Free Reprint Articles
