Posted by Richard Lynch on 05/01/05 23:31

On Sun, May 1, 2005 12:54 pm, Evert | Rooftop Solutions said:
> I'm working on a template engine, and I want my template engine to be
> automaticly started when a .stl file is called from the browser.
> I know this can be done with mod_rewrite, but I really need a
> platform-independant solution. Has anybody some ideas on how to make it
> work everywhere (preferable also on hosts where you don't have access to
> configuration/shared hosting).

At one end of the scale, you could write a Module for Apache, *just* like
PHP is.

At the other end, you could give documentation to users about using
httpd.conf and/or .htaccess and Apache's ForceType directive to fire up
PHP.

Somewhere in the middle, I guess you could create an extension of PHP,
just like php_mysql.[so|dll] and that *might* maybe give you the ability
to hack enough things, including the installer/configure scripts that
would do what you want... Probably not though, now that I think about it.

I think the most realistic approach, honestly, is to just educate
users/hosts how to easily send all your .stl scripts through PHP. If your
..stl becomes even moderately popular, they'll do that, certainly *long*
before they'll install your STL module to Apache.

If a host won't let the webmaster use .htaccess (or whatever IIS does
that's like that) then they're certainly not going to install/configure
their server to use your .stl until it's wildly popular. You can't really
get around that. Focus on making it the best damn Template system and
making it *EASY* for most hosts to configure and QA it.

To give you an analogy:

In the indepdenent music industry, many artists think they want to get a
Distribution deal, where some big-name company will get their music CDs
into all the big-name stores like Tower.

Nothing could be further from the truth, which is:

Demand Drives Distribution

It does one absolutely NO GOOD to have your CDs sitting on the shelf at
Tower, or even Wal-Mart, if nobody ever heard of the band. The CDs will
just collect dust and get shipped back at (ultimately) artist expense.


In the case of .stl --

While making it easy to install/configure .stl is a laudable goal, you're
simply not in a position to make it something the mass-market
ultra-conservative control-panel-only webhosts will allow to be installed,
no matter *HOW* easy it is. In fact, you're at the point now where such
hosts will actively work to "suppress" your .stl engine, as an unproven
un-tested un-trusted technology.

Your effort (for now) needs to focus on the hosts who allow some degree of
configuration/control to their clients.

If a webmaster (or their host) can't (won't) do this in .htaccess
(httpd.conf):

<Files ~ *.stl>
ForceType application/x-httpd-php
</Files>

then you need to ignore them for now, until you're an 800-pound gorilla
they can't ignore :-)

WARNING: I may have the <Files ...> part wrong...
--
Like Music?
http://l-i-e.com/artists.htm

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