These are executed in real-time serverside, so that they can output dynamic information and are the means by which forms work, your counters count, and databases are queried + all kinds of other things can be made to happen.

1. A CGI program can be written in any language that allows it to be executed on the system, such as C/C++, Visual Basic or Fortran If you use a programming language like C or Fortran, you must compile the program for it to run.
2. CGI scripts are often preferred instead of programs, since they are easier to debug, modify, and maintain than a typical compiled program.

NB- Absolutely vital
CGI programs will need to have their permissions set using CHMOD once they have been added to your CGI-bin. This can be done using FTP programs (by selecting the file, right-clicking and selecting CHMOD.) The specific CHMOD setting that you will need to configure varies from program to program. The documentation will tell you what setting you need

Perl is one of the most widely used languages for cgi-scipts. These scripts are used for a very wide variety of purposes

• Counters
• Guestbooks
• BBS systems
• Chat systems
• Mailing lists
• Database manipulation
• Searches
• Form processing
• Shopping carts
• Surveys

Some sources for Perl scripts

Hotscripts

cgi-resource index

Matt's script archive

1001 Resources

PHP( Hypertext Preprocessor ) scripts

This is a server-side scripting language. The server interprets the PHP code and sends the resulting HTML to the requesting browser.

PHP is a very commonly used medium for developing server-side applications, and current versions of PHP support database access through the MySQL database engine. This means developing database clients takes only a small amount of time, and the user interface looks as good as your favorite Web browser.

Some sources for PHP scripts

Arachnoid.com

The Free Country

PHP Resource Index

Dynamic interactive web page technology

In order to make interactive pages that will be organised to carry out tasks and work serverside in realtime, you can also use one of a number of dynamic computer languages

Active Server Pages (ASP)

Active Server Pages or ASP, as it is more commonly known, is a technology that enables you to make dynamic and interactive web pages it was developed by Microsoft. Most ASP pages are written in VBScript.

Your server must support ASP to run it

ASP uses server-side scripting to dynamically produce web pages that are not affected by the type of browser the web site visitor is using.

The default scripting language used for writing ASP is VBScript, although you can use other scripting languages like JScript (Microsoft's version of JavaScript).

ASP pages have the extension .asp instead of .htm, when a page with the extension .asp is requested by a browser the web server knows to interpret any ASP contained within the web page before sending the HTML produced to the browser. This way all the ASP is run on the web server and no ASP will ever be passed to the web browser.

Any web pages containing ASP cannot be run by just simply opening the page in a web browser. The page must be requested through a web server that supports ASP, this is why ASP stands for Active Server Pages, no server, no active pages.

Window Hosted Examples of ASP in action Linux hosted examples of ASP

Java Server Pages (JSP)

JSP or JavaServer Pages, known to be some as the Java Scripting Preprocessor, is a Java technology that allows developers to dynamically generate HTML, XML or some other type of web page. The technology allows Java code and certain pre-defined actions to be embedded into static content.
Your server must support JSP to run it

"Sun's JSP (JavaServer Pages) provides a Java-based way to dynamically serve HTML and other Web content."

See also ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML)