Joy,
J. Peng wrote:
I'm still confused why we need a path_info for the additional info to CGI/modperl scripts? Generally under CGI we say x.cgi?key=value to pass arguments, under modperl handler we say /myHandler/?key=value to do it, or using POST method. Under what case we use path_info?
How about this for an explanation. In the first scenario with the ?, you are passing arguments explicitly using key/value pairs as if it was part of the URL sent by the web browser. In the second scenario, nothing is being passed as key/value pairs. Instead, the server searches up/down the directory hierarchy until it finds a match and everything after the match becomes the argument.
In the first scenario when you are splitting the path into key/value, you need to know where to split it. How? Perhaps by doing a file test with each split yourself? In the second case, you don't need to worry about it.
Not a very technical answer, but maybe an easy way of thinking of things. The second scenario also makes it possible for Google, etc. to index your web pages since it is a "real" URL. In the first case, it is possible, but not as straight-forward.
Ray
