CGI Programming on the World Wide Web (Nutshell Handbooks)

The World Wide Web is more than a place to put up clever documents and pretty pictures. Using the Common Gateway Interface (CGI), you can offer interactive queries and serve instant information from databases, worked up into colorful graphics. This book offers a comprehensive explanation of CGI and related techniques for people who hold on to the dream of providing their own information servers on the Web. The author starts at the beginning, explaining the value of CGI and how it works, then moves swiftly into the subtle details of programming. The majority of examples use the most common platform (UNIX) and the most popular language (Perl) used for CGI programming today. However, the book also introduces the essentials of making CGI work with other platforms and languages.

O'Reilly has done it again! This is my favorite book yet on writing CGI scripts with Perl (5.0). The extensive use of real world applications you can try while learning, and the great examples of how to have CGI interact with databases are especially useful. I suspect I shall order several copies for some of our staff who are new to CGI. Although the book has a UNIX bias, it has much to offer scripters on all platforms.

Note that many competitors cram a CD-ROM into their books to give greater "shelf appeal". Don't be fooled. O'Reilly continues its economically and ecologically sensible approach of pointing you to their FTP site to obtain the example code used in the book. (Thanks, Tim!) Highly Recommended.