htmSQL
is a CGI program that is written in the C language and resides on
your Web server. It can process
special directives that are embedded in an HTML file. These directives
describe one or more SQL statements and incorporate formatted results
into the Web page that is created by the HTML file.
htmSQL passes your SQL to
a
SAS/SHARE server, performs the requested updates and queries, and
retrieves the results sets. The desired page is created dynamically
and returned through the Web server to the Web browser. See the data
flow and required components in the following diagram:
The Web server calls htmSQL each time it receives a URL that specifies
the htmSQL program name. htmSQL supports both the
GET
and
POST
CGI methods for sending form data.
htmSQL reads the input
file for information that is contained within any of its directives.
It processes this information and returns the results to the Web server.
It returns all HTML information to the Web server just as it appears
in the input file.
The following example
illustrates a URL for htmSQL:
http://yourserver/dir/executable_file/filename.hsql?query_string
-
yourserver
is your Web server host
name (and port, if required).
-
dir
is the path of the Web server
CGI program directory that contains htmSQL.
-
executable_file
is the htmSQL program
name. For UNIX and
z/OS, the program name is htmSQL. For Windows,
the program name is htmSQL.exe.
-
filename.hsql
is your
htmSQL input file. Each file can contain multiple SQL statements and other input files
by reference.
-
query_string
specifies values for
one or more of the variables that are referenced in the input file.
The variable name and value pairs are separated by ampersands (&)
and are specified using the following format:
var1=value1&var2=value2&...varN=valueN
Note: Some Web servers can be
configured to recognize
an input file by its file extension
and to automatically call the appropriate CGI program to process the
file. If your Web server can be configured this way, you can omit
the path to htmSQL when you specify the URL (that is, you can omit
the
dir and
executable_file values). Consult your Web server
documentation for details about whether and how your server can be
so configured.
For more information
about CGI and CGI scripting, refer to the Common Gateway Interface
documentation provided by W3C at
www.w3.org/CGI
.