>
>Hi all,
>
>Sorry for this rambling mail, but I just had one of those "see the
>light" experiences that leaves you feeling both like a genius and an
>idiot at the same time.
>
>Like others I guess, I've been trying to get to grips with the new
>sockets features of Metacard, and seeing how these can be used for
>various internet/intranet purposes. So I've been doing some reading
>up of various internet protocols and tried to implement some
>client-side http as part of this.
>
>Anyway, all this attention to web protocols seems to have blinded me
>to the basic concept of sockets. I've been approaching the whole
>thing with the premise that it's necesary to use established
>protocols (ftp, http, etc.) to use sockets. However, it just came to
>me that client and server programs can communicate any way they like,
>as long as they can understand each other.
>
>I have to thank Brian (Yennie) of this list for this "discovery".
>While browsing some old mails, I came across his scripts for checking
>whether a computer was still online or not. I couldn't believe it was
>that simple. ("accept connections on port 8080 with message whatever"
>and your server application is running. Come on, Scott! This is
>embarrassingly easy. Who's going to take this seriously? :))
Well, if you consider a server some app that's just listening.
>
>I can see the importance of implementing established protocols if you
>need to communicate widely, for example, to apache servers from
>client Metacard programs or with web browsers from a Metacard server
>program. However, my interest is with more restricted applications.
>In particualr, with intranet-based training programs where a single
>Metacard client program has to communicate with an intranet server
>program to process results , be served lessons, tests, etc.
>
>Instead of grappling with cgi scripting, web protocols and the like,
>it seems all I have to do is put a Metacard program on an accessible
>machine, set it to accept connections, and then basically implement a
>set of matching read/write handlers at the client and server ends. A
>private protocol, so to speak.
>
>So my questions:
>
>Is it really this easy, in principle at least?
Yes.
>
>What are the pitfalls?
Only your specialized clients will ever be able to communicate with the server.
>
>Is Metacard ready for the big time in this regard? (I.e. will it run
>all day on a server?)
>
>Aplogies if all this is blindingly obvious.
>
>Cheers
>Dave Cragg
Regards, Andu
_______________________
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
Info: http://www.xworlds.com/metacard/mailinglist.htm
Please send bug reports to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, not this list.
