Linux hosting allows you to run technologies such as PHP, mySQL, CGI, Perl and C++ applications. A LINUX host is generally less expensive than a Windows based host as the operating system cost is much less expensive. When looking for a LINUX host it is generally good to inquire about the base operating system and what version of PHP and mySQL they are currently supporting.

Secure Socket Layers provide a means for submitting encrypted data via the web. SSL works based upon a public key / certificate system. As data is transmitted it is encrypted into 40 bit encryption and the web server then decrypts the data once it is transmitted. In the rare occasion that the data was stolen during the transmission process the only data that they would be encrypted which means that viewing it would show nothing but letters, numbers, and symbols randomly mixed.

In order for this process to work without many warning messages from IE and Netscape about possible security hazards a certificate must be obtained from a trusted source. A certificate is only good for one domain name.

When using a LINUX system it is sometimes necessary to enable certain HTML files executable for the purpose of using SSI. Server Side Includes is often used to run a cgi script. An include is called with an example such as this: After you insert your include, you must mark the HTML file as executable so the server will parse the file. This is done using one of two options.

1) Renaming the file to .shtml: On our server any file name .shtml will be parsed. So instead of having an index.html file, you would name it index.shtml. This is the easiest way of enabling includes.

2) CHMODing the file to 777: With CHMOD 777 you can also mark a file as executable. It is important to only make the files which you want parsed executable. This poses certain security issues, as well as a strain on our resources, as the processor has to work harder to parse a file.

SSI is often used to include something into an HTML page. You can insert the contents of one HTML page into another page. An example of a practical usage for this would be to include your e-mail address at the bottom of each page. If you do this as an include, then when your e-mail address changes, you will only have to update it on one page and not your entire web site. Another usage is to call cgi scripts into action. Many counters, clocks, and other scripts are called using SSI. The command used will most likely be provided in the documentation of your cgi script.

(For instance: http://www.worldwidemart.com/scripts/) or (http://cgi.resourceindex.com/Programs_and_Scripts/)

We do allow running of cgi scripts on the servers, however they must conform to our acceptable server resource usage policy. If we deem that a script is using an excessive amount of server resources, it will be disabled.

Before a cgi script will work certain modifications must be made to them. Certain paths must be specified in some scripts. After the "#" in the first line of the perl script, the path to perl must be specified. /usr/bin/perl should suffice for this path. Below is a printout of a "whereis perl" from our system.

Another program that needs to be specified in many scripts is sendmail. This is located at /usr/sbin/sendmail