My first script...please be patient.

Please confirm/correct my understandings:

DBMan is a scipt I can use to make information on my website searchable? (Like Amazon.com, or sidewalk.com)

The documents in the download can be uploaded to my server (via FTP) and are activated by user input to a form?

The form is automatically created by the HTML portion of the document included with the DBMan download?

The CGI/Perl script sits on my server at www.myserver.com/mysite/cgi-bin/dbman/db.cgi

If my domain name is www.dummy.com , how will the search come up? Must I create a "tag" that says Go To Search Page which would be www.myserver.com/mysite/cgi-bin/dbman/db.cgi , or can my sysAdmin make it: www.dummy.com/cgi-bin/dbman/db.cgi ??

The database DBMan will search will be in default.db, and the script will just point to this file for a search?

The output of the search will be produced by the HTML tags in the script and can be modified to taste.

Thanks in advance for your tolerant responses!

  
No problem. We were all "newbies" at one time.


Pretty much. At present there aren't some of the fancier search capabilites, but in general, yes.


Yep.


You got it.


Most of the time servers will allow you to call your cgi-bin through your domain name. It will probably be

www.dummy.com/cgi-bin/db.cgi

I would try uploading the demo scripts to your server, using the above URL. If it doesn't work, try the other one.


Sorta. If you don't specify a db= in the URL, the script looks for default.cfg for the configuration file. The name of the .db file is listed in the .cfg file.

You can have more than one .cfg file, though, as long as you give it a new name. If you had, for example, a database called "friends," you would create a friends.cfg file which had the correct file names in it and then use

www.dummy.com/cgi-bin/db.cgi?db=friends

to access the database.


Yep. One caveat, however. Before you start getting fancy with your html.pl file, make sure your database works. It's really hard to debug a script with a bunch of extra stuff in it. Once you know your fields work the way you want them to and you have installed the modifications you want (if any), go to it. Have a ball.

Just to see some different things that can be done, take a look at the list of sites that use DBMan at
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/scripts/resources/DBMan/Sites_In_Action/


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JPD







[This message has been edited by JPDeni (edited May 18, 1999).]