CGI::Fast(3) User Contributed Perl Documentation CGI::Fast(3)
NAME
CGI::Fast - CGI Interface for Fast CGI
SYNOPSIS
use CGI::Fast qw(:standard);
$COUNTER = 0;
while (new CGI::Fast) {
print header;
print start_html("Fast CGI Rocks");
print
h1("Fast CGI Rocks"),
"Invocation number ",b($COUNTER++),
" PID ",b($$),".",
hr;
print end_html;
}
DESCRIPTION
CGI::Fast is a subclass of the CGI object created by CGI.pm. It is
specialized to work well FCGI module, which greatly speeds up CGI
scripts by turning them into persistently running server processes.
Scripts that perform time-consuming initialization processes, such as
loading large modules or opening persistent database connections, will
see large performance improvements.
OTHER PIECES OF THE PUZZLE
In order to use CGI::Fast you'll need the FCGI module. See
http://www.cpan.org/ for details.
WRITING FASTCGI PERL SCRIPTS
FastCGI scripts are persistent: one or more copies of the script are
started up when the server initializes, and stay around until the
server exits or they die a natural death. After performing whatever
one-time initialization it needs, the script enters a loop waiting for
incoming connections, processing the request, and waiting some more.
A typical FastCGI script will look like this:
#!/usr/bin/perl
use CGI::Fast;
&do_some_initialization();
while ($q = new CGI::Fast) {
&process_request($q);
}
Each time there's a new request, CGI::Fast returns a CGI object to your
loop. The rest of the time your script waits in the call to new().
When the server requests that your script be terminated, new() will
return undef. You can of course exit earlier if you choose. A new
version of the script will be respawned to take its place (this may be
necessary in order to avoid Perl memory leaks in long-running scripts).
CGI.pm's default CGI object mode also works. Just modify the loop this
way:
while (new CGI::Fast) {
&process_request;
}
Calls to header(), start_form(), etc. will all operate on the current
request.
INSTALLING FASTCGI SCRIPTS
See the FastCGI developer's kit documentation for full details. On the
Apache server, the following line must be added to srm.conf:
AddType application/x-httpd-fcgi .fcgi
FastCGI scripts must end in the extension .fcgi. For each script you
install, you must add something like the following to srm.conf:
FastCgiServer /usr/etc/httpd/fcgi-bin/file_upload.fcgi -processes 2
This instructs Apache to launch two copies of file_upload.fcgi at
startup time.
USING FASTCGI SCRIPTS AS CGI SCRIPTS
Any script that works correctly as a FastCGI script will also work
correctly when installed as a vanilla CGI script. However it will not
see any performance benefit.
EXTERNAL FASTCGI SERVER INVOCATION
FastCGI supports a TCP/IP transport mechanism which allows FastCGI
scripts to run external to the webserver, perhaps on a remote machine.
To configure the webserver to connect to an external FastCGI server,
you would add the following to your srm.conf:
FastCgiExternalServer /usr/etc/httpd/fcgi-bin/file_upload.fcgi -host sputnik:8888
Two environment variables affect how the "CGI::Fast" object is created,
allowing "CGI::Fast" to be used as an external FastCGI server. (See
"FCGI" documentation for "FCGI::OpenSocket" for more information.)
FCGI_SOCKET_PATH
The address (TCP/IP) or path (UNIX Domain) of the socket the
external FastCGI script to which bind an listen for incoming
connections from the web server.
FCGI_LISTEN_QUEUE
Maximum length of the queue of pending connections.
For example:
#!/usr/local/bin/perl # must be a FastCGI version of perl!
use CGI::Fast;
&do_some_initialization();
$ENV{FCGI_SOCKET_PATH} = "sputnik:8888";
$ENV{FCGI_LISTEN_QUEUE} = 100;
while ($q = new CGI::Fast) {
&process_request($q);
}
CAVEATS
I haven't tested this very much.
AUTHOR INFORMATION
Copyright 1996-1998, Lincoln D. Stein. All rights reserved.
This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.
Address bug reports and comments to: lstein AT cshl.org
BUGS
This section intentionally left blank.
SEE ALSO
CGI::Carp, CGI
perl v5.16.3 2011-11-09 CGI::Fast(3)