CODEWITHSUNDEEP
apacheshellubuntunginxwebserver
Arjun
Arjun

Reputation: 1711

How do I call a local shell script from a web server?

I am running Ubuntu 11 and I would like to setup a simple webserver that responds to an http request by calling a local script with the GET or POST parameters. This script (already written) does some stuff and creates a file. This file should be made available at a URL, and the webserver should then make an http request to another server telling it to download the created file.

How would I go about setting this up? I'm not a total beginner with linux, but I wouldn't say I know it well either.

What webserver should I use? How do I give permission for the script to access local resources to create the file in question? I'm not too concerned with security or anything, this is for a personal experiment (I have control over all the computers involved). I've used apache before, but I've never set it up.

Any help would be appreciated..

Upvotes: 12

Views: 44807

Answers (1)

Brigand
Brigand

Reputation: 86260

This tutorial looks good, but it's a bit brief.

I have apache installed. If you don't: sudo apt-get install apache2.

cd /usr/lib/cgi-bin

# Make a file and let everyone execute it
sudo touch test.sh && chmod a+x test.sh

Then put the some code in the file. For example:

#!/bin/bash
# get today's date
OUTPUT="$(date)"
# You must add following two lines before
# outputting data to the web browser from shell
# script
 echo "Content-type: text/html"
 echo ""
 echo "<html><head><title>Demo</title></head><body>"
 echo "Today is $OUTPUT <br>"
 echo "Current directory is $(pwd) <br>"
 echo "Shell Script name is $0"
 echo "</body></html>"

And finally open your browser and type http://localhost/cgi-bin/test.sh

If all goes well (as it did for me) you should see...

Today is Sun Dec 4 ...
Current directory is /usr/lib/cgi-bin Shell
Shell Script name is /usr/lib/cgi-bin/test.sh

Upvotes: 15

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