Most of 1-4 can be answered by using some persistent environment to run your CGI scripts in (read: mod_perl for apache!). With that, you only read each module in once (per server) and you only need only persistent DBI connection. If you can run mod_perl, by all means do so, but do realize that if you have existing CGI scripts, you'll probably need to whittle at them a bit to make them mod_perl friendly.

As for CGI and SSI, I would use SSI on mostly static pages, particularly those that are not results of any previous CGI (eg, for a quote of the day, or the like). Anything else should be done with CGI and a template solution; in most cases, the template module can be cached if you use mod_perl, so you gain a further advantage.

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Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com || "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain