Re: a little more help with python server-side scripting

[John Salerno]

Paul Boddie wrote:

> To sum up:
> 
>  1. Copy the three line "CGI with Python" example, save it as
> yourfile.py, upload it, test it. If it works, celebrate and move
> on to step 2. If it doesn't, move on to step 2 anyway. ;-)
> 
>  2. Copy the Web page example from the Microsoft link, save it
> as yourfile.asp and also as yourfile.html, upload them, test
> them. If one of them works, celebrate and note down whether
> you should be using .asp or .html on the end of your filenames.
> If both of them work, celebrate more vigorously! If neither work,
> try and tell us what went wrong.

Thank you. I'm going to study your response and give it all a try!  :)
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Re: a little more help with python server-side scripting

[Paul Boddie]

John Salerno wrote:
>
> Well, I appreciate the help. I'm trying to figure it out, but it seems
> like with each new post, there is some new technology being mentioned or
> new method to do what I'm trying to do.

Let's just consolidate what we've learned here. Your provider says that
you can serve up two different things; the first one being...

 bits of Python code that are embedded within an HTML file

... (this being from a message you quoted), although they don't really
make themselves totally clear, because they then say...

 that after mapping .html will no
 longer be call as normal html file to be loaded on the browser as the
 IIS server now will parse .html with the Python executable engine.
 Your user will need to embed the Python coding into each of the .html
 file in order for it to be load properly on the browser.

...which sounds like ASP to me, noting that the "Python executable
engine" is probably the Active Scripting engine which can work with
Python. So let's call that the "ASP with Python" route.

Now, the other thing they said you could serve up are Python scripts:

 Save your python script as .py file on the wwwroot and
 you may call the scripts using http://www.yourdomain.com/yourfile.py

What these scripts have to do when they run is to output some text
which consists of some headers and the text of a Web page that will
appear in your browser (and you can test them yourself before you
upload them by seeing if they output the expected stuff when you run
them). Let's call this the "CGI with Python" route.

> I guess I'm not well-versed
> enough in Python to even attempt this kind of thing yet. I didn't
> realize it would be this complicated. I guess I hoped it would be as
> easy as including some PHP code and letting the server detect the .php
> extension and handle it all. I'm going to try to solidify the basics
> first, then move on to web programming a little later.

Well, guessing at your configuration from what the support people have
said, it may be simpler to just test things with the "CGI with Python"
option first. So, if you take a CGI program such as one from this
page...

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/52220

...like this one...

#!/usr/bin/python
import cgi
cgi.test()

...save it as yourfile.py, upload it as instructed above, and then
visit your site (also as instructed above), you should see some test
output from Python. (Again, you can check the output by running
yourfile.py locally and seeing that it prints out some HTML to the
screen.)

If you want to do the PHP-style thing - the "ASP with Python" option -
then you probably need to make a Web page, similar to that described
here...

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B276494

...save it as yourfile.html (given what they said in their response to
you, although most people thought it should be yourfile.asp - why not
try both?!), upload it, and then visit your site (as instructed above,
but remembering that you're looking for a file called yourfile.html or
yourfile.asp instead of yourfile.py).

If the yourfile.html thing doesn't work but the yourfile.asp does, then
forget about what they said about HTML files and .html and remapping
things: just call your "ASP with Python" files names with .asp on the
end.

To sum up:

 1. Copy the three line "CGI with Python" example, save it as
yourfile.py, upload it, test it. If it works, celebrate and move
on to step 2. If it doesn't, move on to step 2 anyway. ;-)

 2. Copy the Web page example from the Microsoft link, save it
as yourfile.asp and also as yourfile.html, upload them, test
them. If one of them works, celebrate and note down whether
you should be using .asp or .html on the end of your filenames.
If both of them work, celebrate more vigorously! If neither work,
try and tell us what went wrong.

Good luck!

Paul

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Re: a little more help with python server-side scripting

[John Salerno]

Magnus Lycka wrote:

> Listen John. This will be the last time I respond
> to this thread, since you just ask more and more
> instead of digesting all the information you are
> given. Why should we spend time on answers if you
> don't read them properly anyway.

Well, I appreciate the help. I'm trying to figure it out, but it seems 
like with each new post, there is some new technology being mentioned or 
new method to do what I'm trying to do. I guess I'm not well-versed 
enough in Python to even attempt this kind of thing yet. I didn't 
realize it would be this complicated. I guess I hoped it would be as 
easy as including some PHP code and letting the server detect the .php 
extension and handle it all. I'm going to try to solidify the basics 
first, then move on to web programming a little later.
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Re: a little more help with python server-side scripting

[Magnus Lycka]

John Salerno wrote:
> But isn't this code:
> 
> Response.Write('Python Test')
> Response.write('Smaller heading')
> 
> written using ASP instead of Python?

Listen John. This will be the last time I respond
to this thread, since you just ask more and more
instead of digesting all the information you are
given. Why should we spend time on answers if you
don't read them properly anyway.

I understand that you are confused, but you need to
analyze the material you have been provided. ASP is
not a programming language. The code above shows the
Python ASP API.

Most ASP developers use VBScript, and since ASP is one
of those technologies Microsoft tosses at clueless
people, I'm sure many people who use VBScript in ASP
don't understand the distinction, and those who hire
ASP developers or buy web site development often don't.
These guys will probably also think that Sun's language
Java and Netscape Corp's JavaScript are the same things
too. Clueless.

The example is a bit boring of course, since it doesn't
show anything except a few calls that probably look
almost the same in most languages that can be used in
ASP. If there had just been a loop or something...

Whatever web tool kit you use, there will be an API
that you must learn. An interface for communicating with
these mechanisms that provide the web server interface.

In the web context, there is some sort of request made
from a browser (or spider or whatever) and based on that,
the Python script (CGI, ASP, SkunkWeb PSP or whatever)
must handle the request (if there are parameters to care
about) and produce some kind of response.

In a CGI script, you work on a very low level, and need
to print content-type headers, error codes etc. In ASP,
your API takes care of the details, and you just print
the "meat". This abstraction is managed through the
Response object. I'm sure you can find plenty of help
on the web. Use google.
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Re: a little more help with python server-side scripting

[Gerard Flanagan]

John Salerno wrote:
> Kent Johnson wrote:
> > John Salerno wrote:
> >> Magnus Lycka wrote:
> >>
> >>> The other option is ASP. You have been given information about
> >>> that already. Be aware that ASP does not imply VBScript. You can
> >>> use Python in ASP as long as that's enabled. It seems to be exactly
> >>> what you are asking for, so I don't understand why you seem to reject
> >>> it. Don't you like the file name endings?
> >>
> >>
> >> Maybe I'm misunderstanding what is meant when you say to use ASP. I'm
> >> thinking that it involves having to learn another language (such as C#
> >> with ASP.NET), instead of writing my code in Python. Is that not the
> >> case?
> >
> > See http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B276494
> >
> > The last example on this page is exactly what you have been asking for.
> >
> > Kent
>
> But isn't this code:
>
> Response.Write('Python Test')
> Response.write('Smaller heading')
>
> written using ASP instead of Python?


Here's a demo script called 'tut1.asp' located in
'site-packages\win32comext\axscript\Demos\client\asp':





for i in range(3,8):
  Response.Write("Hello World!!
" % i)





###

and here is 'CreateObject.asp' from the same directory:





# Just for the sake of the demo, our Python script engine
# will create a Python.Interpreter COM object, and call that.

# This is completely useless, as the Python Script Engine is
# completely normal Python, and ASP does not impose retrictions, so
# there is nothing the COM object can do that we can not do natively.

o = Server.CreateObject("Python.Interpreter")

Response.Write("Python says 1+1=" + str(o.Eval("1+1")))






Gerard

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