Apache::ASP is a scripting technology that can be used to make your Web pages more dyanmic. Scripts can be embedded within your Web files, and the server will execute the commands and produce results that will appear in the Web browser.

Apache::ASP is not the same as Microsoft .Net ASP. They are similiar in functionality, but you cannot simply take a Microsoft ASP page and drop it on our servers and expect it to work. Microsoft ASP is based in the Basic language, and Apache::ASP is based on the Perl scripting language. There are some good resources on the Web, and the firt place to start is at www.apache-asp.org.

Debugging Apache::ASP Scripts

A common problem when first using Apache::ASP are syntax errors. By default, when the server encounters an error in your ASP script, it will end the processing and return an error page saying "Internal Error Encountered."

In order to activate useful debugging information, you will have to create and upload a .htaccess file in the directory (or ancestral directory) that contains the ASP script you wish to debug. The contents of that file should include:

<Files ~ \.asp$>
  SetHandler perl-script
  PerlHandler Apache::ASP
  PerlSetVar Debug 2
</Files>


You may wish to remove the debugging directive, or set it to 1, once you are satistifed with your programming, since setting the debugging directive will slow down the server's processing of scripts. The value of 1 will send debugging information to the server log file, the value of 2 will send extra html to the client and the value of 3 will log microtimes.