CGI.pm is a large and widely used Perl module for programming Common Gateway Interface (CGI) web applications, providing a consistent API for receiving user input and producing HTML or XHTML output. A Perl module is a discrete component of software for the Perl programming language. ... Wikibooks has more about this subject: Computer programming Computer programming (often simply programming) is the craft of implementing one or more interrelated abstract algorithms using a particular programming language to produce a concrete computer program. ... Common Gateway Interface (CGI) is an important World Wide Web technology that enables a client web browser to request data from a program executed on the Web server. ... Spider Web Web can refer to: Spider web: A mesh built by a spider, composed of spider silk and usually used for catching prey. ... API with 3 clients, using the Unified Modeling Language notation An application programming interface (API) is a set of definitions of the ways one piece of computer software communicates with another. ... In computing, HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is a markup language designed for the creation of web pages and other information viewable in a browser. ... Extensible HyperText Markup Language, or XHTML, is a markup language that has the same expressive possibilities as HTML, but a stricter syntax. ...

The module is written and maintained by Lincoln D. Stein.

A Sample CGI Page

Here is a simple CGI page, written in Perl using CGI.pm (in object oriented style): In computer science, object-oriented programming, OOP for short, is a computer programming paradigm. ...

 #!/usr/bin/perl # use strict; use warnings; use CGI; my $q = CGI->new(); print $q->header('text/html'); print $q->start_html('A Simple CGI Page'), $q->h1('A Simple CGI Page'), $q->start_form, 'Name: ', $q->textfield('name'), $q->br, 'Age: ', $q->textfield('age'), $q->p, $q->submit('Submit!'), $q->end_form, $q->p, $q->hr; if ( $q->param('name') ) { print 'Your name is ', $q->param('name'), $q->br; } if ( $q->param('age') ) { print 'You are ', $q->param('age'), ' years old.'; } print $q->end_html; 

This would print a very simple webform, asking for your name and age, and after having been submitted, redisplaying the form with the name and age displayed below it. This sample makes use of CGI.pm's object-oriented abilities; it can also be done by calling functions directly, without the $q->.

External Links

• Official homepage
• CGI.pm – at the CPAN

Wikibooks Programming has more about this subject:

Perl CGI