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Differences between current version and revision by previous author of CGI.

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Newer page: version 4 Last edited on Sunday, October 31, 2004 7:26:32 am by AristotlePagaltzis
Older page: version 1 Last edited on Sunday, August 10, 2003 4:11:04 pm by WikiAdmin Revert
@@ -1,3 +1,9 @@
 [Acronym] for the __C__ommon __G__ateway __I__nterface 
  
-a way of having a web server run a program to return a webpage . the [CGI] specification specifies things like PATH_INFO, QUERY_STRING, REMOTE_USER as environmental variables that you can query ot find out information about the request
+A standard that defines the conditions a [CGI] program should be able to expect .  
+  
+A [CGI] program is run by a WebServer to process certain requests. It is expected to return output to be sent back as the server's response to that request. That output will often be a WebPage, but might also be anything else the server can send, like an image or a binary file.  
+  
+The standard specifies EnvironmentVariable~s that provide information about the request, like <tt> PATH_INFO</tt> , <tt> QUERY_STRING</tt> , <tt> REMOTE_USER</tt>, and more, as well as details such as where STDIN/OUT/ERR should be connected.  
+  
+Note that this means that [CGI] programs can be written in any ProgrammingLanguage, even if "[CGI]" is commonly -- and wrongly -- associated with [Perl]