in reply to cgi Beginner

I don't know anything about WebShop, but getting a prototype for your web store shouldn't be too overwhelming. How much functionality does this program need to have by the 13th? If it's just a prototype to prove it can be done, you should be fine.

Also, where does the information about your products come from? Do you have an existing database you're going to connect to, or is it all from scratch?


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DamnDirtyApe 
Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who
would like to seem profound to the crowd strive for obscurity.
            --Friedrich Nietzsche

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Re: Re: cgi Beginner
by willyb21 (Initiate) on Nov 08, 2002 at 20:04 UTC
    It just needs to run. All the products are in an existing database, in fact What I have is the entire website my boss setup about 4 years ago for another company. He just cannot remember how he got it working. His site was on a actual web server visable to the internet mine is only to be visable to our intranet. Would this make a Difference? Thanks For your quick response
[reply]

      Thanks for the extra info. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but it sounds to me like you're a bit green at web development, or at least at CGI programming. Here's some advice that might get you going.

      The basic catalogue should generally consist of two main components: A way of determining what products the customer wants to see, and a way of getting that information from your database to the customer's screen.

      To determine what it is your customer want's to see, you'll want to read the parameters in the url. If an address such as http://www.mystore.com/catalogue.pl?category_id=201 were requested, your script catalogue.pl should use the CGI module to read the category requested, then construct a SQL query and query the database using the DBI module.

      The database will (hopefully) return some product information for you. You'll probably want to loop through this info, and display it to the user in a useful form. This should at least get you started with a functional catalogue.

      One more thing I'd suggest is that you look at using a templating system (my favourite is the Template Toolkit) to separate your application code (Perl) from your presentation code (HTML/Javascript/...). It will make your life much, much easier. :-)

      Good luck, and just ask if you have any more questions.


      _______________
      DamnDirtyApe 
      Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who
would like to seem profound to the crowd strive for obscurity.
            --Friedrich Nietzsche
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