I haven't a clue where to begin! 1

ThinAir · May 6, 1999

Howdy, 
 
I want to install a perl (interpreter?) on my workstation and our server NT Server w/IIS 4) I've installed the active perl download to my NT 4 workstation. I' don't really know where to begin. my goal is to get a simple script that collects the following: 
 
name: 
e-mail: 
 
friend1 name: 
friend2 name: 
friend3 name: 
 
Message: (come visit this great site! at....) 
 
and then sends out message from the name: to the to the 3 friends with the message. 
I've copied a script and tried to use it/modify it... but no go. I've installed perl. I've gotten lost for days in the perl.com online docs. Just swiming. I think that perl is working, because I did get one thing to scroll a mess of stuff on the cmd screen, but never again (I don't know how I did it the first time! 
 
I've tried to place the correct files in the correct places... like I know! ;-) 
 
Is there a simple, 5 step way to make and test a script? is there anything that I can read in under 2 hours that can get me going? 
 
Can anyone help me? 
 
I'm good with photoshop, tureSpace, corel, frontpage, html... but this programming thing is a giant black hole! 
 
Thanks much! 
 
Bruce Searl 
Thin Air Advertising & Design 
541-686-1279

robherc · May 6, 1999

Well, if you'd be willing to use JavaScript (a slightly easier language than Perl anyways), then I could help you tremendously. That would be a relatively easy task for me to perform using JavaScritp. 
 
Please let me know if JavaScript is OK with you. 
 
 
-Robherc

Glen · May 6, 1999

As a resource, I would first recommend the O'Riley llama book (Learning Perl). Two hours with the llama should get you going. Too bad you are using NT. If you were using Unix, I could give you the code in about 4 lines. 
 
How do you send mail from the command line with NT? Is there a sendmail command?

MikeLacey · May 10, 1999

Is there a sendmail command?" 
 
You can buy an addon that does all the things unix sendmail does.... 
 
try

http://www.computershopper.com

Or you can go for the pucker jobbie from

http://www.sendmail.com

Mike

ThinAir · May 11, 1999

Wow! I'm gone! I'm back! I couldn't get logged into the forum for a week, but I'm back in... Gee, you guys are all unix geeks? I'm an NT dweeb (I suppose that that is some one who can't even program and is on NT! pitiful! ;-) 
 
I've been tinkering... and I know that I have perl running, as I can print the hello world! test from the cmd shell by invoking perl and feeding it frist.pl 
 
I still can't get my script to run. the permission on the front page directory are set to allow scripts to run. 
 
the sample that am using calls formmail.cgi but it looks the same as formmail.pl both of which seem to spit out taxt if run form the cmd box and then it closes quickly. The perl inturpreter is in my executable path, and I can envoke perl form various directories with no problem and print my test. 
 
Mike I don't know if there is a "sendmail command" per sey, I mean, I can have sendmail under NT, but I don't know if it is configured, running or what ever. 
 
I purchased the Cammel book, read about 30 pages, fogged over and took it back. It didn't help much in the way of actually installing/getting the things to run in the first place. I was thinking about the Lamma book, but I've gotten so discurraged that I'm not sure if I have it in me to compound my failure with more! ;-) 
I've had our programmer here waste a day and he can't figure it out either. should I have to learn to program the silly language in order get a "ready to go" script installed? 
 
Now, I should confess that it is a script that I swiped off of another page, using the formmail.pl/cgi script (I don't know the difference and it appears that my NT box doesn't either! ;-) 
 
It works when I leave the location of the perl and scripts alone, but if I change them to run locally, it chokes with 501 errors. 
 
RobHerc, I would certainly be willing to use JAVA Script, aside from it not working with a few of the visitors who are still on Netscape 1.0 or something, the main reason that I wanted to use this simple CGI was so that I could get and make sure that perl was working on my box and on our server NTserver4 IIS4, so that I could also then install some of CGI-worlds scripts like the pole it and mailing list manager scripts. They can't won't don't tell me how to actually install perl, which I think I have done, but If I can't figure out how to get this simple of a script to work, I'm afraid of what a mess something more complex could be! ;-) 
 
so If I do use JAVA script, I still have the larger perl problem., but that may be what I have to do. 
 
I have a friend that is coming up to help for a few min. maybe he can figure it out.

ThinAir · May 11, 1999

Nope, Still not working! I'm pretty confused. 
 
Any other suggestions? 
 
Bruce 
541-686-1279

MikeLacey · May 12, 1999

It sounds as if your PATH variable is not set correctly - or something like that. 
 
I would agree that you shouldn't have to learn a language just to install a program/script. Have a look at the documentation for your web server and find out where it looks for scripts and such. There might also be some hints and getting perl scripts to work with your web server - it's a fairly popular combination. 
 
Sorry I can't be more specific but I've never done web development. It's probably something really simple - dig around in the documentation, ring their tech support of they've got one. I am, I admit, a bit of a Unix person and don't really hold with all this newfangled web business. <grin> 
 
 
Mike

ThinAir · May 12, 1999

I know that the dos path variable is set correctly. as I can invoke the perl inturpreter from any dir at a command prompt window. 
 
I don't know if IIS 3.0 is set up correctly. I'm going to upgrade to IIS 4 today and go through the FAQ setup for NT with IIS 4 and see if that helps. 
 
Bruce

Guest_imported · May 14, 1999

Try the following websites. I have found them all to be of great resource to the act of just getting perl up and running. Hope these help!

http://www.itp.tsoa.nyu.edu/~student/jamie/help/cgi-perl/

http://www.webdesigns1.com/perl/ps.html

http://www.weblint.org/~neilb/perl/introduction/home.html

http://virtualschool.edu/lang/perl/

ThinAir · May 25, 1999

Thanks everyone! I do in fact have perl installed and running. (after a lot of hassel and sleuthing!) I just don't have sendmail on NT It looks like I can use Blat.exe but I don't know if this is true or not. 
 
The link suggested by "MikeLacey (MIS) May 10, 1999 
 
"Is there a sendmail command?" 
 
You can buy an addon that does all the things unix sendmail does.... 
 
try

http://www.computershopper.com"

just gets me to ZDNet's online search & buy store. I can't find any products that are NT versions of sendmail there. 
 
So I'm still wondering what I can do short of spending $500 on an NT port of sendmail! ouch! 
 
Perl is not turning out to be so utopic! ;-) 
 
I purchased the Ilamma book, and am slowly working my way through it... I don't really want to be a programmer! I just wanted to get a simple script to work. Sort of saddening! 
 
Thanks much for all the help. 
 
Bruce Searl 
Thin Air Ad

Milamber · Jun 15, 1999

Hi everyone, 
 
I'm far from being either a Perl or web server genious, but I had what seems like a similar problem. 
The script would run in perl, but the web server refused to run it. 
The solution for me was the first line of the script! 
The line(in *nix perl scripts): #!/usr/bin/perl 
In the Win32 version of perl, I found that it should still point to your perl interpreter, but using win32 directory structure conventions, for example: #!C:\perl\perl 
 
Now placing the script into the cgi-bin directory of your web server (I use Apache), and all is sweet! (Provided there are no errors in your script, of course!!) 
 
Cheers, 
Milamber

robherc · Jun 15, 1999

Bruce- 
 
There are two FREE Unix type OSs out there that would allow you to do what you're wanting MUCH more easily (don't even have to buy sendmail for NT(YUCK!) ;-) 
 
One is Linux (

http://www.linux.org)

the other is FreeBSD (not sure on a URL...will search for one, then post it here) 
 
Both of these are great Operating systems (well; for progs. @ least [hint, hint];-) and have been know to run servers for months/years w/o crashing! (and, best of all, you can get LOTS of free programs for 'em) 
 
Hope this'll help you, 
-Robherc 
robherc@netzero.net

ThinAir · Jun 15, 1999

Howdy, 
 
I really appriciate the help from you all. I'm on another deadline so I've put perl aside for a few weeks. but will have to come back to it. 
 
Milamber, I have the scripts working fine now, (the test scripts) so I know that perl is installed correctly and working under NT. It required editing my registry files after the install (which didn't mention anything about needing to do that, of course! ;-) 
 
Robherc, I am tempted to take your advice, but it reqires several things. 1) I must get a system to run it on. 2) I must install Unix, (which probably has a whole bunch of things to learn too!), I don't have the money to toss at another machine right now, and I don't think I've got the heart to try to become Unix savvy just to get a perl script to work. (I feel that there may be ethical and moral reasons as well, such as seeking truth in cross platform compatability that perl is supposed to do so well... but lets not get into that! ;-) 
 
When I get the chance I'll down load Blat.exe and see if it can work with my scripts. 
 
If not, then I'm probably going to have to cave in and use Unix! 
 
 
Thanks much, 
 
Bruce Searl

robherc · Jun 15, 1999

Bruce- 
 
You DON'T have to buy another machine OR use Unix for my suggestions! ;-) 
 
All you have to do is: 
 
1) Partition your Hard drive (1GB is WAY MORE than enough to COMFORTABLY run EITHER Linux or freeBSD on your computer

2) Download & install the new OS into the new partition 
3) Download & install a Perl interpreter for the OS that you choose & install it in the new partition as well. 
 
that's all there is to it! It's really NOT as terrible as many (Microsoft) would like for you to think!

I hope you will enjoy this! 
 
 
-Robherc 
robherc@netzero.net

ThinAir · Jun 16, 1999

Howdy, 
 
Don't take this wrong, I mean it in fun... 
 
Hey Robherc, what good does it do me to partition a 1GB space and install Linux or FreeBSD, if my server is running NT and I am running NT? My script would only work when I booted to Unix! ;-) 
 
This seems pretty inconvienient! ;-) 
 
I could just develop on the unix side... but then I give up... everything but notepad and I sort of hooked on photoshop 5, trueSpace, frontpage, dreamweaver, and the growing use of active server pages here in our development office. I know that some of these apps may run on a unix box, but will all of them? what about my outlook, soundforge, and about 50 other apps? 
 
I agree that the path of least resistence would be to just cave in and install unix and then use many of these scripts as is... but I can't take my system or our server down, at all, to do that. Our NT server may crash more, I've not had it crash yet in 3 months, but it is what we have commited to (perhaps we should be committed! ;-) and seem to be, in general a very nice platform. 
 
I don't have enough alturistic energy to fight the monsters in Redmond, and despite all the junk that the force us to beta test, I often do like some of their products! ;-) 
 
Anyway, I appriciate your help and perspective, 
 
 
Thanks much! 
 
 
bruce searl 
bruce@thinairad.com

robherc · Jun 16, 1999

Another fun msg; but the info is real: 
 
Crash More?! Than a Windows OS?! How's that possible?????? 
(Linux, Unix, & FreeBSD are KNOWN for their crash-resistance...how 'bout changing your 3 month record to a 3 YEAR one???) 
 
I can see where you're coming from in wanting to keep your familiar windows-based programs; but you might want to check out places like:

http://www.downloads.com

or

http://shareware.netscape.com

to find out what kind of Linux/Unix/FreeBSD programs are out there (many of them are FREE too!) it might make switching seem a little more feaseable (but then again...it might not ;-) 
 
I'm not in any way trying to sell you on Linux, FreeBSD, or anything else...just letting you know that there are other options out there; trying to encourage you, or at least SOMEONE to explore the possibilities that surround us & not just follow Microsoft around like a dedicated little puppy dog (no slam intended) 
 
 
-Robherc 
robherc@netzero.net

ThinAir · Jun 17, 1999

Howdy, 
 
Crash more, than windows? - sure, a mac crashes WAY more than my NT workstation box does. I crash about once a month if it run low on disk space, and try to run Corel 8, photoshop, and word all at the same time with say a 100mb image file (which opens a 1GB swap file) and try to let corel take anything in the way of files space. But other wise I don't crash much at all. Win95 is similar to the Mac. 
I wonder what would happen if you could run similar massive apps on Unix, with as many strange hardware configs as Windows supports, (which seems to be the main problem with crashing, all that hardware and buggy drivers.)

http://www.downloads.com

- I went there! wow, lots of windows, WinNT apps. But when I sorted on OS, Unix/Linix... nothing! no apps. Was this supposed to convince of the derth of unix apps?! ;-) 
 
Do you do any development on NT/win platforms? 
 
Good talking with you! 
 
Bruce 
bruce@thinairad.com

robherc · Jun 17, 1999

Try starting from the following URL:

http://www.download.com/pc/cdoor/0,323,0-355,00.html?st.dl.fd.cats.cat355

I don't know why you ended up with zero results; I was actually very impressed by the sheer quantity of Linux apps when I first searched for them...what did you search under before sorting? Windows Apps? (sorry, not meant offensively; I'm just a little confused as to how you COULD not end up finding any Linux apps) 
 
In answer to your question: "Do you do any development..." 
YES, at the present I do all of my development on a Win95 system which I can't upgrade to a better OS (i.e. Linux/FreeBSD) because of the modems I'm using (just happen to be 2 of the VERY few types that don't yet have Linux-compat. drivers). As far as the development I do goes, though; I only REALLY program in: Batch, JavaScript, and HTML...I'm just STARTING to learn Perl; and I only ABOUT to start learning Visual Basic. 
 
 
-Robherc 
robherc@netzero.net

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