CGI::Fast(3pm)

1CGI::Fast(3)          User Contributed Perl Documentation         CGI::Fast(3)
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NAME

6       CGI::Fast - CGI Interface for Fast CGI
7

SYNOPSIS

9           use CGI::Fast qw(:standard);
10           $COUNTER = 0;
11           while (new CGI::Fast) {
12               print header;
13               print start_html("Fast CGI Rocks");
14               print
15                   h1("Fast CGI Rocks"),
16                   "Invocation number ",b($COUNTER++),
17                   " PID ",b($$),".",
18                   hr;
19               print end_html;
20           }
21

DESCRIPTION

23       CGI::Fast is a subclass of the CGI object created by CGI.pm.  It is
24       specialized to work well FCGI module, which greatly speeds up CGI
25       scripts by turning them into persistently running server processes.
26       Scripts that perform time-consuming initialization processes, such as
27       loading large modules or opening persistent database connections, will
28       see large performance improvements.
29

OTHER PIECES OF THE PUZZLE

31       In order to use CGI::Fast you'll need the FCGI module.  See
32       http://www.cpan.org/ for details.
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WRITING FASTCGI PERL SCRIPTS

35       FastCGI scripts are persistent: one or more copies of the script are
36       started up when the server initializes, and stay around until the
37       server exits or they die a natural death.  After performing whatever
38       one-time initialization it needs, the script enters a loop waiting for
39       incoming connections, processing the request, and waiting some more.
40
41       A typical FastCGI script will look like this:
42
43           #!/usr/bin/perl
44           use CGI::Fast;
45           &do_some_initialization();
46           while ($q = new CGI::Fast) {
47               &process_request($q);
48           }
49
50       Each time there's a new request, CGI::Fast returns a CGI object to your
51       loop.  The rest of the time your script waits in the call to new().
52       When the server requests that your script be terminated, new() will
53       return undef.  You can of course exit earlier if you choose.  A new
54       version of the script will be respawned to take its place (this may be
55       necessary in order to avoid Perl memory leaks in long-running scripts).
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57       CGI.pm's default CGI object mode also works.  Just modify the loop this
58       way:
59
60           while (new CGI::Fast) {
61               &process_request;
62           }
63
64       Calls to header(), start_form(), etc. will all operate on the current
65       request.
66

INSTALLING FASTCGI SCRIPTS

68       See the FastCGI developer's kit documentation for full details.  On the
69       Apache server, the following line must be added to srm.conf:
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71           AddType application/x-httpd-fcgi .fcgi
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73       FastCGI scripts must end in the extension .fcgi.  For each script you
74       install, you must add something like the following to srm.conf:
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76           FastCgiServer /usr/etc/httpd/fcgi-bin/file_upload.fcgi -processes 2
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78       This instructs Apache to launch two copies of file_upload.fcgi at
79       startup time.
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USING FASTCGI SCRIPTS AS CGI SCRIPTS

82       Any script that works correctly as a FastCGI script will also work
83       correctly when installed as a vanilla CGI script.  However it will not
84       see any performance benefit.
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EXTERNAL FASTCGI SERVER INVOCATION

87       FastCGI supports a TCP/IP transport mechanism which allows FastCGI
88       scripts to run external to the webserver, perhaps on a remote machine.
89       To configure the webserver to connect to an external FastCGI server,
90       you would add the following to your srm.conf:
91
92           FastCgiExternalServer /usr/etc/httpd/fcgi-bin/file_upload.fcgi -host sputnik:8888
93
94       Two environment variables affect how the "CGI::Fast" object is created,
95       allowing "CGI::Fast" to be used as an external FastCGI server.  (See
96       "FCGI" documentation for "FCGI::OpenSocket" for more information.)
97
98       FCGI_SOCKET_PATH
99           The address (TCP/IP) or path (UNIX Domain) of the socket the
100           external FastCGI script to which bind an listen for incoming
101           connections from the web server.
102
103       FCGI_LISTEN_QUEUE
104           Maximum length of the queue of pending connections.
105
106       For example:
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108           #!/usr/local/bin/perl    # must be a FastCGI version of perl!
109           use CGI::Fast;
110           &do_some_initialization();
111           $ENV{FCGI_SOCKET_PATH} = "sputnik:8888";
112           $ENV{FCGI_LISTEN_QUEUE} = 100;
113           while ($q = new CGI::Fast) {
114               &process_request($q);
115           }
116

CAVEATS

118       I haven't tested this very much.
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AUTHOR INFORMATION

121       Copyright 1996-1998, Lincoln D. Stein.  All rights reserved.
122
123       This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
124       under the same terms as Perl itself.
125
126       Address bug reports and comments to: lstein@cshl.org
127

BUGS

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