Re: How to interface WWW Unix server with Novell oracle server

rhodge_at_us.oracle.com wrote:

>Just a couple points to clarify. Perl is a much more robust language for
>handling flat files, but if you want your structured data in a database,
>or you already have all of your info in a Oracle7, then WOW in
>conjunction with PL/SQL is a better fit. Your developers will already
>understand PL/SQL, and you will enjoy the advantage of being able to
>create dynamic HTML right in the stored procedures and delivering
>completed pages back to your web server.

That is certainly true. However, it's not an all or nothing proposition, one can use both PL/SQL (WOW) and Perl. For the actual interaction with Oracle, PL/SQL has the advantage, of course. But consider this scenerio:

1. use PL/SQL proc to generate complex data entry HTML form. in particular, some of the fields are pulldowns derived from lookups into Oracle tables.
2. once user fills out this form, one wants to validate their entries extensively. For such validation, having a good regular-expression library is a great time-saver. If one has a pl/sql lib for this, fine; otherwise:
3. when the initial data is submitted, have it call a perl script instead where the validation is much easier.
4. having repeated step 3 until all data valid, hand the data back (in hidden fields if you wish) in an html form which again returns to a pl/sql proc to do the actual updating to Oracle

NOTES:
1) this use of perl doesn't require any interfacing of perl to Oracle (ala

   oraperl). In fact, C or FORTRAN could be used just as well as perl if    they are more suitable for the task at hand. 2) such a multi-stage process is, of course, too cumbersome if one is getting

   just a few (simple) fields.
3) It is possible to write a large subset of a regexp lib in pl/sql

   by adapting publically available Pascal code into PL/SQL. See chapter 5    of Kernighan's "Software Tools in Pascal"

--
Thomas Dunbar    703 231-3938    http://gserver.grads.vt.edu/