DCL Server

It is possible to write a W3 server in DCL, the VMS command interpreter language. This has the advantage (over C for example) of quick prototyping and easy access to the VMS systems functions available in DCL. Seee also:

The KVI WWW server.

Server structure

The server must run in a DCL environment. That is, if it is run as a detached process, this must be done by running LOGINOUT.EXE with a command file as input. That command file will run the server executable WWW_SERVER.EXE.

The WWW_SERVER.EXE program will loop waiting for connection from a W3 client. When it gets one, it calls a DCL command of your choice (defined at WWW_SERVER.EXE compile time) passsing it the device name of the channel for communication with the client, the document id requested, and search terms if any. The DCL command (here we assume it is a call to a command file) analyses the request and returns the result ot the client through the given channel.

The WWW_SERVER.EXE program may also be run from the command line for testing:

$ g :== $disk$whatever:[full.dir.spec]www_server.exe $ g -a *:8000 -v

Note here the server command line options which are the same as for the basic W3 daemon. The -a option specifies the port number to listen on as 8000. Note the process needs some sort of privilege to run with port numbers below 1024. the -v option turns on diagnostic output to the terminal.

Source

The source files all can be taken from the regualar WWWDaemon_v.vv.tar.Z distribution file except:

DCLServer.c

The C code module which calls the DCL file. A #define in this module defines the DCL file name.

docdbgate.com

An example DCL command file (developped for the FNAl DOCDB gateway in fact).

The MMS file

The MMS (VMS Module Managment System) description file which contains the command to build the server. If you don't have MMS, you can probably figure out how to build it by reading this file.

Writing the DCL file

When you write the DCL file, you should bear in mind that the W3 protocol is a telnet-style protocol, and requires each line to be terminated with a CR, LF pair. (Carriage Return, Line feed, ASCII 13,10). The example code shows how you can append a CRLF pair to the end of a DCL output line.

The first parameter passed to the command file is the device name of the internet socket. This must be opened for write by the DCL file. Thanks to Jonathan Streets (FNAL) for figuring that bit out.

Building the server

To make the WWW_SERVER.EXE file, you run MMS with the macro MULTINET=1 defined. Put the MMS file as descrip.mms in the same directory. $ MMS/macro=(multinet=1)

The code has been tested with Multinet/TCP-IP. If you run it with UCX or WIN_TCP, you should define one of those instead of MULTINET. (see the descrip file.) This code worked with MULTINET -- it is possible that the method of getting the socket device name and passing it to the DCL file doesn't work with UCX or WIN_TCP. (The code as is has been slightly stripped down scince the last tes, so any typos are mine - TBL)