Wow it's been so long ago.

How to create a .info file

Well, apt on our Debian etch distribution has been giving us trouble for a long time as we hadn't created a .info file for the modules we had created. This was probably due to the fact that we used the httpd.conf file that we had edited to load the modules we had created.

So we created a .info file for both modules, inthe following way:

1. Create a text file containing at least the line to load your module, such as
   
   LoadModule: jaspacho_module /usr/lib/apache/1.3/mod_jaspacho.so
   
   You can replace jaspacho_module with you module name, and the path with your module's path.



2. Now, save your file as something like 500mod_jaspacho.info. The 3 digit integer is a label to determine the order in which modules will be loaded. Lower numbers are loaded first. It is best to put 500 for this, unless the order of loading is important to your module. The rest of the file name is the same as that of your module's compile filename(without the extension that is).



3. You can also add a description line to the .info file, by placing a line in the following format after the LoadModule line:
   
   Description: Description of module ...
   



4. Now, place this file in the same directory as the one in which your compile module is stored by apache.
   

Finally done

At last, we have finished everything, at least as far as Mumbai University is concerned. That means we have finished a decent amount of code, written a report and made a presentation for an external examiner.

We finally figured out a way to call ASP objects without having to break our heads on irritating string handling. All we had to do was define wrappers to the functions and define objects including pointers to these wrappers as member functions.

We managed to write implementations for the calls Response.Write(), Response.Flush() and Request.QueryString(). Fortunately, all of these work.

The project report was also completed in LaTeX, and almost miraculously, the bound reports were received, although very late, just in time for the presentation.

The presentation itself was written in HTML and JavaScript.

Fortunately, we had a very nice lady, the principal of MET college, as the external. She turned out to be very knowledgeable, and was very impressed with our project. So that turned out to be way cool.

Let's hope we find the time to complete this project in the future.

Great Progress

We have been making excellent progress in our project. for starters we have manged to use the SpiderMonkey API to execute JavaScript. However, this does not take care of loops. So, we had to build loops ourselves, before sending them to SpiderMonkey. Fortunately, we managed this too. However that still leaves HTML embedded in the loops. This will take a little bit of thought, and the code is in a major mess.

At the same time, we have managed to write ASP scripts to a file and get them executed with the asp-perl command-line utility. This is a major breakthrough. Now, this has to be integrated into the main code.

At the same time the documentation is nearly complete. The onkly bits left have to do with stuff we haven't done yet.

Let's hope we finish everything quickly.

Break-through ....

Well, we finally came to know that there is a command line utility for running asp-perl scripts.
And it works just fine...!!

Also we successfully installed SpiderMonkey JavasScript engine and also found a command-line utility for JavaScript interpretation.

So, we are now in the thought process of using shell-scripts so as to complete the project ASAP.
The next move is at present to split our work into the cheap and the costly.

Cheap : Using shell-scripts to implement object calls.
Costly : Writing the Module using the API of SMJS and Apache::ASP.

Cheap way can be completed by, about, 10 days.

GOD BLESS US..!! Abundantly with bigger break-throughs..!!

Savio Monteiro

Testing DSO waters

Well, now that we have a design for Hyena ready, we have started making a test DSO module, mainly to figure out what we need when writing a module for Apache.

Some progress has been made here, and a small test modue has been written, namely hyenatry.c.

It was compiled with the following command (as root):
apxs -i -a -c -n hyenatry hyenatry.c

Now, we need to figure out how to test it.

Finally... progress!!

At last, we seem to be making progress. After splitting up our group into 2, Gerard and Hardik have been making progess in figuring out lex and yacc.

Rohan and Savio, despite the fact that there is still no working code, thanks to problems with SpiderMonkey configuration, have also made progress. Rohan has come up with his initial version of Hyena's detailed design in pseudocode, which follows:


//First Hyena is woken up by Apache when a request for an ASP page is received

//Main function
{
Fetch ASP file;

set state to HTML;

if first line has <%@LANGUAGE="JAVASCRIPT"%>
{
while end-of-file not reached
{
read line;

if state is HTML
output line;
else
execute line;
}
}//Execute ASP-JavaScript
else
{
//Need to check what ASP-Perl does here
}
}

//This method gives HTML output to Apache
//Note: Detailed mechanism needs to be figured out
//Output method
{
while <% or end-of-line is not encountered
output characters to Apache;

if <% is encountered
{
set state to ASP;
execute rest of line;
}

if end-of-line is encountered
return;
}

//This method executes the ASP-JavaScript code
//Execute method
{
while %> or end-of-line or ; not encountered
{
if ASP-function-call exist
{
execute parameter of ASP-function-call;
executeASP ASP-function-call;
executeJS stuff before function call + result of function call;
}
else
executeJS line;
}

if %> is encountered
{
set state to HTML;
output rest of line;
}

if end-of-line or ; encountered
return;
}


Let's hope we continue at a fair clip from now on.