$URL_ROOT="/basm101/public_html/perl_scripts";
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I believe they would work from a public_html directory. You should spell out the whole URL. The sample directory that comes with PerlPlusPlugin has something like this in it:

$URL_ROOT="http://www.Lehigh.EDU/~sol0/ptk/ppl";
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URL's can end in many things. In fact, that's how the browser knows how to deal with the file. You need to have something like this in apache-mime.types:

application/x-perlplus          ppl
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And of course you have to have the plugin installed for your Netscape browser (e.g. set it up in Preferences/Helper Applications).

The Alias stuff is for the Apache configuration file, to allow you to have extra directories for things. I wouldn't bother with it since you can put them in your public_html directory instead.

hmm well I still don't know what Im doing wrong ! I decided to put a perl_scripts directory
within my cgi-bin directory and go to that URL. I still get the error
"Error:security level=60! ERROR:Attempt to execute unauthorized application failed"

I wanted to look in the log and I stuck to the default path for it which was this:

open(LOG, ">>/tmp/perlplus-secure.log");
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Should that write to the tmp directory on my system ? I looked in the tmp directory
where all stuff like cookies from the web etc. goes..but its not there

In fact in case it helps you help me here is the whole cgi security script:

use CGI;
$q = new CGI;

open(LOG, ">>/tmp/perlplus-secure.log");
$url = $q->param('URL');
print LOG "URL=" . $url . "\n";

# Some potentially useful environment variables you can play with:
#
# DOCUMENT_ROOT=/ahome
# GATEWAY_INTERFACE=CGI/1.1
# HTTP_HOST=www.xyz.edu
# HTTP_REFERER=http://www.xyz.EDU/~sol0/ptk/plop.ppl
# HTTP_USER_AGENT='Mozilla/4.5C-SGI [en] (X11; I; IRIX 6.3 IP32)'
# REMOTE_ADDR=a.b.c.d
# REMOTE_PORT=12801
# REQUEST_METHOD=POST
# REQUEST_URI=/cgi-bin/perlplus-secure.cgi
# SCRIPT_FILENAME=/home/wwwserv/cgi-bin/perlplus-secure.cgi
# SCRIPT_NAME=/cgi-bin/perlplus-secure.cgi
# SERVER_NAME=www.xyz.EDU
# SERVER_PORT=80
# SERVER_PROTOCOL=HTTP/1.0
# SERVER_SOFTWARE=Apache/1.2.6

# This example varies the security level as required for the sample pl
+ugins:

#$URL_ROOT="http://www/~eserte/ppl";
#$URL_ROOT="http://www.Lehigh.EDU/~sol0/ptk/ppl";
$URL_ROOT="http://myhost/~basm101/cgi-bin/perl_scripts";
%url = ("$URL_ROOT/neko.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/plop.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/y2k.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/thunder.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/ptk_test.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/quest.ppl" => 3,
    "$URL_ROOT/tktetris.ppl" => 3
       );

$sec_level= $url{$url} || 1;

print LOG "  security level=$sec_level\n";
close LOG;
                                                    
print "Content-type: application/x-perlplus:.ppl:Perl\n\n";
print "$sec_level";
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I did screw around with the numbers, but I think level 3 means the script
should execute.
thanks again for your help,
basm101