Re: XML ==> CGI?

["Brad Stone" <brad@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 10 Sep 2004 14:59:41 -0500 (CDT)
 Scott Klement <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> > It's nice to know that with XML a person can be an
> expert and a novice at
> > the same time.  :)  Your XML explanation got me
> thinking--what can you tell
> > me in 50 words or less about CGI?
> 
> You'll have to forgive me if I don't go out of my way to
> make this less
> than 50 words.  It's very time consuming to keep
> rephrasing your sentences
> until you get them as concise as possible.
> 

Scott's right... explaining CGI in 50 words or less is a
task.  I've written two books (best sellers!) on AS/400 and
RPG related CGI.  I devoted some large sections to how CGI
works, how the communications between the browser and web
server and CGI programs work, etc.  You can check these
books out at:

http://www.bvstools.com/erpg/

I also have done a large number of articles on the subject
for Midrange Computing (now www.mcpressonline.com), iSeries
Expert's Journal and  Spotlight magazine.  I know some of
them are available online for free from mcpressonline.com.
 They would really be a great starting point as to how you
do CGI programming with RPG.

For a general CGI description, as I mentioned my eRPG book
(first one mainly) explains it in a very down to earth way.
 I'm sure there are also many places on the web where you
could read about the general workings of CGI since it
doesn't change from platform to platform.  The basic
concept is the same (ie write data to a web page with a
program, use a program to read data from web forms).

I also have a toolkit similar to CGIDEV2 named the eRPG
SDK.. you can find more info on it at www.erpgsdk.com.  

But, one word of advice after dealing with thousands of
folks on this subject, don't start out with such a toolkit.
 Understanding (at least at a high level) how they work
will help you better utilize them.  This means
understanding the terms standard input, standard output,
POST, GET, HTTP headers, etc..

Also understanding topics such as HTML, JavaScript, CSS,
SSI and other web topics will also help you in your
development.

Hope this helps!

Brad
www.bvstools.com