9781930110069

Web Development with Apache and Perl: How to Build Powerful Web Sites with Open Source Tools is written for Web developers and managers who are considering alternatives to commercial products, this guide to Apache and Perl provides information and instructions for building Web sites. Criteria for selecting an operating system and strategies for configuring a Web server are introduced, and a discussion of Open Source databases and development tools is included. Also provided are sample designs for common types of Web sites and techniques for content development and management. Topics such as security, performance, and ways to merge scripts and HTML, all using freely available software, are highlighted.

Theo Petersen is a Perl and Apache developer. He lives in Denver, Colorado.

Preface

xii

Acknowledgments

xvi

Author online

xvii

About the cover illustration

xviii

Part 1 Web site basics

1

(68)

Open Source

3

(17)

What is Open Source?

3

(2)

And it's free!

5

(1)

Why choose Open Source

5

(9)

Support

5

(3)

Quality

8

(2)

Security

10

(1)

Innovation

11

(3)

A buyer's guide to Open Source

14

(3)

Stable version and ongoing development

14

(1)

Support

15

(1)

Leveraging other investments

15

(1)

Ongoing costs

16

(1)

Open Source licensing

17

(3)

The GPL and LGPL

18

(1)

The BSD/MIT license

18

(1)

The Artistic License/``Perl terms''

19

(1)

The right license?

19

(1)

The web server

20

(19)

What makes a good web server

21

(3)

Hardware

21

(1)

Operating system

22

(1)

Re-evaluation and installation

23

(1)

Securing the site

24

(1)

The case for Apache

25

(3)

Installation

26

(1)

First tests

27

(1)

Apache configuration

28

(2)

The httpd.conf configuration file

28

(1)

Things you need to change

29

(1)

Production server

30

(3)

Development server

33

(2)

Allow everything

33

(1)

Allow documents and scripts

34

(1)

Allow approved documents

34

(1)

Using apachectl

35

(1)

Serving documents

36

(1)

thttpd

37

(2)

CGI scripts

39

(30)

Why scripting

40

(2)

Scripting language choices

41

(1)

The case for Perl

42

(4)

Installing Perl

44

(1)

Testing a sample script

44

(1)

Updating Perl modules with CPAN

45

(1)

Inside CGI

46

(20)

Hello, Web!

48

(3)

Dynamic content

51

(3)

Interacting

54

(3)

HTML forms with CGI.pm

57

(6)

Taking action

63

(3)

Strictness, warnings, and taint checking

66

(1)

CGI modules

67

(2)

Part 2 Tools for web applications

69

(136)

Databases

71

(33)

Files

72

(1)

Address book

72

(3)

Hash files

75

(7)

Perl's tie and hash Flies

76

(1)

Hash file address book

77

(5)

Relational databases

82

(5)

What's relational?

82

(2)

Choosing a relational database

84

(1)

MySQL

84

(1)

PostgreSQL

85

(2)

Which to choose

87

(1)

Installing MySQL

87

(2)

Set the root password

87

(1)

Create a database

87

(1)

Add users and permissions

87

(1)

Create tables

88

(1)

Testing the server

88

(1)

Learning more

89

(1)

DBI, Perl's database interface

89

(8)

Installing the Perl modules

89

(1)

Making a connection

90

(1)

CGI scripts with DBI

91

(6)

Data maintenance via CGI

97

(7)

WDBI

97

(1)

HTML View, an alternative to WDBI

97

(1)

Installing WDBI

98

(1)

Creating a definition File

99

(1)

Using WDBI

100

(2)

Enhancing forms

102

(2)

Better scripting

104

(30)

Why CGI is slow

105

(3)

Stateless protocol

106

(1)

Session-oriented persistent CGI

107

(1)

FastCGI

108

(1)

The case for mod_perl

109

(2)

Buyer's guide

110

(1)

Installing mod_perl

111

(3)

Building and rebuilding

112

(1)

Apache run-time configuration

112

(2)

Scripting with mod_perl

114

(5)

Apache::Registry

115

(2)

Apache::DBI

117

(1)

When CGI attacks

118

(1)

Beyond CGI

119

(3)

Beyond CGI.pm?

121

(1)

mod_perl goodies

122

(1)

Apache::Status

123

(1)

Maintaining user state

123

(11)

Apache::Session

124

(1)

A to-do list

125

(4)

Cookie sessions

129

(3)

Session management and user management

132

(2)

Security and users

134

(29)

Listening in on the Web

134

(1)

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)

135

(2)

Legal issues

136

(1)

OpenSSL and Apache

137

(6)

Apache-SSL

137

(1)

mod_ssl

138

(1)

Installing mod_ssl

138

(1)

Certificates

139

(2)

Configure and test

141

(2)

User authentication

143

(9)

Using HTTP authentication

144

(2)

Doing your own authentication

146

(6)

Do I need SSL for this?

152

(1)

User management

152

(4)

Login sessions

156

(7)

Combining Perl and HTML

163

(42)

HTML design

163

(1)

Server-side includes

164

(3)

SSI with mod_perl and Apache::Include

166

(1)

Scripting in HTML

167

(7)

Perl and HTML

168

(2)

Templates

170

(4)

HTML::Mason

174

(16)

The case for Mason

174

(1)

Installation

175

(1)

Making pages from components

176

(4)

How Mason interprets components

180

(1)

Faking missing components with dhandlers

181

(1)

Autohandlers

182

(4)

Session management

186

(3)

Mason resources

189

(1)

The Template Toolkit

190

(12)

Template environment

191

(3)

Uploading a document

194

(4)

Viewing the upload directories

198

(4)

Template Toolkit resources

202

(1)

XML alternatives

202

(3)

Part 3 Example sites

205

(110)

Virtual communities

207

(30)

Serving the community

208

(3)

Community site examples

208

(3)

Implementing features

211

(13)

News

211

(3)

Forums

214

(4)

Chats

218

(3)

Search engines

221

(3)

Building a site

224

(10)

Installation

225

(1)

httpd.conf

226

(2)

mod_perl.conf

228

(1)

The front page

228

(3)

News

231

(1)

Forums

232

(1)

Chat

232

(1)

Searching

233

(1)

Improvements

233

(1)

Slash, the Slashdot code

234

(1)

Online resources

235

(2)

Search engine submission

235

(2)

Intranet applications

237

(36)

Documentation and file server

238

(4)

Documentation directory tree

238

(1)

File server

239

(1)

Generating index pages

240

(1)

mod_perl for indexing

241

(1)

Searching

242

(1)

Office applications

242

(9)

Email

243

(4)

Calendar

247

(3)

Project management

250

(1)

Interfaces to nonweb applications

251

(5)

Other Perl interface tools

252

(2)

Passwords

254

(1)

File management

255

(1)

System administration

256

(3)

WebMIN

257

(2)

Build your own portal

259

(10)

Maintaining links

260

(2)

UserDir, Redirect, and mod_rewrite for user maintenance

262

(2)

mod_perl for translation and redirection

264

(5)

Joining multiple intranets

269

(4)

VPNs

270

(1)

PPP

271

(1)

SSH

271

(1)

Put it all together, it spells...

271

(2)

The web storefront

273

(42)

E-commerce requirements

274

(2)

Security and privacy

274

(1)

Stress testing

275

(1)

Components of an e-commerce site

276

(23)

Catalog

277

(5)

Account data

282

(4)

Shopping cart

286

(5)

Taking the order

291

(5)

Tracking shipments

296

(3)

Feedback

299

(4)

Product reviews

299

(3)

Customer feedback and other services

302

(1)

Open Source e-commerce tools

303

(8)

Interchange

304

(4)

AllCommerce

308

(3)

Credit card processing

311

(4)

CCVS

313

(2)

Part 4 Site management

315

(80)

Content management

317

(41)

Development life cycle

318

(8)

Development, staging, production

319

(1)

A staging area on your production server

319

(7)

Tools for content management

326

(19)

FrontPage

326

(1)

rsync

327

(6)

Mason-CM

333

(10)

WebDAV

343

(2)

Managing a production site

345

(7)

Configuration

345

(4)

Development to staging

349

(1)

Staging to production

350

(2)

Backup and recovery

352

(6)

Backup

353

(2)

Recovery

355

(1)

Test and verify!

356

(2)

Performance Management

358

(37)

Victims of success

359

(9)

Monitoring system loads

361

(3)

Stress-testing your server

364

(4)

Tuning your server

368

(14)

Apache configuration

369

(4)

mod_perl issues

373

(7)

Socket tricks

380

(2)

Web farming

382

(13)

Reverse proxies

383

(5)

Squid accelerator

388

(1)

Load balancing

389

(6)

References

395

(2)

Index

397

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Web Development With Apache and Perl

1930110065

Summary

Author Biography

Table of Contents

Supplemental Materials

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