CGI Programming on the World Wide Web (Nutshell Handbook)
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Spotlight Customer Reviews
Average Customer Rating: 3.45Customer Rating: 5
Summary: O'Reilly and Associates have done it again!
Comment: O'Reilly and Associates has yet another feather in their cap with this outstanding book. The text is clear and consise. Everything you need to know about CGI is explained in this book.
I read this book from cover to cover in 2 days. CGI was a complete mystery to me. I thought it was going to be something complex based on all of the hype. It turns out that CGI is very simple if explained properly, which this book most definitely does. Now that I am programming CGI on a routine basis, I find myself referencing this book often.
The only negative for this book (this is REALLY being picky) is that the examples are written exclusively in Perl. In fact, if you don't know the basics of Perl, I recommend you consult one of the two outstanding O'Reilly and Associates books on Perl first. While I acknowledge that Perl is the easiest and most popular language to use for CGI development, I would have preferred a stronger discussion using C/C++ for those of us looking for extra efficiency in our developed programs. With a little extra time and energy, all of the examples in the book could be written in each of the popular CGI languages: Perl, C, C++, TCL, and VB. If a second edition were to be published with the examples in multiple languages and a companion CD containing these examples, my rating for this book would be an 11 for sure!
Customer Rating: 4
Summary: CGI Programming on the World Wide Web
Comment: CGI Programming on the World Wide We
Customer Rating: 4
Summary: Good Introduction to CGI
Comment: If you have a basic understanding of Perl and HTML, this book helps youlearn CGI. The book also introduced me to postscript and gd, which havebeen quite valuable for a lot of applicatioins. I enjoyed Shishir'smodest, down-to-earth writing style. Since many people have criticizedthis book, let me refute the most common criticisms:"The source code should be on a CD-ROM".No. Programming is in the fingers. You learn by typing. Anyway, you canFTP it if your lazy."The level of detail is poor".That's what man pages and FAQ's are for. Shishir is giving more of a guided tour of CGI, with just enough detail to get started in each area."The source code has mistakes/is missing semicolons."I didn't find this problem. But anyway, you should know enough Perl to put the semicolons where they belong. If you don't know Perl, this bookis not for you.Everything in this book is available on the web, but the book will savethe beginner a ton of time digging around.Also, Shishir does not encourage use of CGI.pm, which is both good and bad. I think it's good because it teaches better understanding of the low-level CGI mechanics. On the flipside, use of CGI.pm can protectyou from a lot of obvious mistakes.I haven't found a better introduction to CGI.