About CGIRef

CGIRef is a freeware API library that gives you some high-level routines to use when creating CGI programs to run under Apache/NCSA servers. CGIRef is most useful when dealing with URL-Encoded fields, or parsing fields from HTML forms. I hope that it makes your job easier.

How it got started

When I first got the NCSA httpd server, I noticed that the server came with a few example CGI programs written in C, in the ServerRoot/cgi-src directory, most notably post-query.c (POST method)and query.c(GET Method). As I looked at these, I noticed that they were remarkable similar, in that they both used functions in util.c. Well, to make a long and pedantic story short, I condensed these functions into (IMHO) an easy-to-use set of functions. I now submit these changes to the Internet community for their use/enjoyment, and hope they find them as useful as I have.

Special Thanks

I especially want to thank the original creators of Apache and NCSA httpd. My career would not be where it is today without the hard work of you guys. I also thank all those members of the Internet community who rolled their eyes at seeing yet another USENET question from that newbie guy asking about the inner workings of CGI apps, but went ahead and took the time to help me out.

Please Note

This product is very much in its infancy. No doubt many of you will want to make changes and ports. Go for it. This is a GPL program, so you must make the source code of your changes available free of charge. I would also appreciate it if you let me know when you make a port, so I can include it.

Also, this is my first package to ever publish. I welcome any suggestions on how I can make it better for you.

I want to hear from you

Please let me know if you found CGIRef to be helpful. I welcome any and all suggestions.