Web Server/400 Features

Key Features of Web Server/400

Integrated File System Support

I/Net's Web server can take advantage of the features of the new Integrated File System. These advantages include speed, long file name support, code page conversions, and compatibility with Unix and OS/2 Web pages. The compatibility advantage means that pages from existing Web sites can be directly copied to the AS/400 without changing hyperlinks to other pages or changing the page's contents.

Scripts

A script is any executable program that can be launched by the server at the request of a Web browser. Normally when a browser sends a request to a server, the server satisfies the request by sending back an already created file that contains the data the browser should display to the user. When a script is requested by a browser, instead of sending that script to the browser, the Web server launches the script and sends back the output of the script. This allows for the dynamic creation of HTML documents, images, audios, videos, etc.

I/Net's server supports scripts written in any language supported by the AS/400 including, CL, REXX/400, ILE C, RPG/400, and COBOL/400. The server also follows the Common Gateway Interface (CGI), which is a standard for launching server run scripts. I/NET's Web server makes porting existing CGI scripts trivial and writing new scripts straightforward by providing script helper APIs.

Database Support

One of the AS/400's most prominent uses is handling large, strategic databases. I/Net's Web server provides an easy way of presenting the contents of these databases to a remote user. The presentation is appealing and easily accessible by any user with a Web browser.

Shared Folders Support

Another location available for the storage of Web documents is in Shared Folders. This allows access to existing documents or to new documents created with tools that only support shared folders.

Spooled Files Support

A Web browser is also able to access the contents of AS/400 spooled files. These are served as plain text HTML documents.

Ultimedia System Facilities Support

Web pages typically consist of a large amount of multimedia content including images, audio clips and video clips. An AS/400 customer is able to manage and create this multimedia content using the services of Ultimedia System Facilities (USF). Then, by using a special hyperlink, a Web server can deliver that multimedia content directly out of USF's multimedia repository to a Web browser.

OS/400 V3R1's TCP/IP

I/Net's Web server takes full advantage of OS/400 V3R1's rich TCP/IP stack.

User Directories

User Directories allow Web browsers to access Web pages stored in areas controlled by users rather than in a centralized location that is managed by an administrator. This makes it easy for individuals to provide Web documents.

User Authentication

Password authentication can be done to protect documents. Each directory can require a user to authenticate themselves by supplying a user ID and password before the server will send the requested page. Group IDs are also supported. The "Basic" authentication scheme is used.

Multi-Home Server Support

A multi-home server allows a single machine to serve Web content for multiple host names, each with their own setup and configuration. This would allow two or more host names to be routed to the same machine and have different home pages brought up for each.

Server-Side Includes

Server-side includes provide an easy-to-use method for providing dynamic content within an HTML document. Server-side includes can include another document within the current document, include the output of a CGI script in the middle of an HTML document, include useful values in a document such as the current number of requests or the current time and date, plus many more options.

Logging

The server maintains various logs that makes it easy for customers to determine usage, track down problems, tune a server's performance, and perform many other tasks. Support is provided for access logs, error logs, service logs, and tracing.

Cycling of Log Files

Log files can also be setup to automatically start logging to a new file at specified periods. For instance, every Sunday night at midnight, the access log can save off the current log file and start logging to a new file.

Dynamic Performance Statistics

At anytime, an administrator can get current performance statistics for a running Web server. Statistics such as bytes sent, number of requests, and requests per second are available.

Administration Mode

The Web server can be put into a mode that allows an administrator to see current configuration values, dynamic statistics, and content through a Web browser.

National Language Support

The typical Web servers available today leave it up to the person creating a Web document to make sure that document's contents can be properly displayed when viewed by a Web browser. Therefore, a US English user viewing a French document might have some problems. Also, almost all Web browsers work with ASCII encoded characters and an AS/400 works mostly with EBCDIC encoded characters.

I/Net's Web server ensures that the data served to Web browsers is encoded in the codepage that is expected by that browser. This means that any EBCDIC encoded Web document can be converted to ASCII prior to sending it to the browser. Also, a Web document can be created in a French, EBCDIC codepage and delivered to a US English, ASCII browser to be successfully viewed.

Automatic Index Creation

The normal organization of Web documents is hierarchical. Indexes, or directories of these documents, can be created by someone maintaining them or automatically by the server based on the hierarchy.