Web hosting

The Toolserver provides web hosting to users. Your files should be placed in $HOME/public_html/, and they will be accessible from the Internet at  http:// toolserver.org/~ /.

Note: For tools, we recommend using multi-maintainer projects. This allows one tool to have multiple maintainers and a stable URL, rather than being tied to a single user. However, you can also put tools under your own account if you like.

CGI
For CGI scripts, there are two options: plain CGI and FastCGI. If possible, you should use FastCGI, since it's faster, and reduces the load on the web server. However, if you have already-written CGI scripts, you can use them unmodified if you don't have the time to convert them to FastCGI.

To use FastCGI scripts, place them in $HOME/public_html/, with the extension .fcgi, and make sure they're executable. Do not place them in $HOME/public_html/cgi-bin/, since they will be executed as plain CGI scripts, even if they have the .fcgi extension.

To use plain CGI scripts, place them in $HOME/public_html/ and give them the extension .cgi, or place them in $HOME/public_html/cgi-bin/</tt>, in which case they can have any (or no) extension. Wherever you place them, both CGI and FastCGI scripts need to be executable (chmod 755</tt>).

PHP scripts (which must have the extension .php</tt>) can be used anywhere in your public_html</tt> but should not be placed in cgi-bin</tt>.

For information about CGI and Perl, see the Perl page. For information about (Fast)CGI and Python, see the Python WSGI page

Logs

 * Access and error logs are located in /var/log/http/</tt> on the web servers.
 * The PHP log is located at /var/log/userlog</tt> on the web servers.

Webalizer statistics for toolserver.org are here (updated every 6 hours). Contact Duesentrieb if this is broken.

At present, there are separate access and error logs for each web server, and requests are distributed randomly to each server. To aid in debugging, you can use a URL like  http: //wolfsbane.toolserver.org/~username/mytool/</tt> to force the request to a particular server, then look at that server's logs.

In the future, we hope to have unified logs for all web servers.

SSL
The Toolserver (including user web space) is also accessible over SSL at https://toolserver.org. This is identical to non-SSL access, except:


 * The X-TS-SSL: YES header will be sent to allow tools to detect if SSL is in use
 * If you send a redirect with Location: http://toolserver.org/path from an SSL page, it will be rewritten to https://toolserver.org/path. There is no way to disable this.

Frequently asked questions

 * Where can I find documentation about my programming language?
 * For generic questions, try Google or an IRC channel. Some specific issues have been documented on this wiki at the programming language's name, e.g., Perl.


 * Is it possible to use .htaccess</tt>-files?
 * Yes.


 * How does URL rewriting and authentication work?
 * See ZWS.


 * Is there a license requirement for my tools?
 * See Default license.