Zot-Dispatch 2.0

Zot-Dispatch is a general purpose Common Gateway Interface (CGI) compliant program written at the University of California, Irvine which makes using HTML forms on the World Wide Web much easier. Through the use of hidden input tags in an HTML form, Zot-Dispatch can be tailored to handle the data that is submitted in a way that meets your specific needs.

Zot-Dispatch (ZD) can "dispatch" your data in three basic ways:

Any combination of the three methods and as many of each as desired may be used at the same time.

The form in which the data is dispatched is up to you. Zot-Dispatch provides a default format which is simply a listing of the name=value pairs that are returned by the client, but it also allows you to specify a response template into which the values of the submitted data can be substituted.

An added feature of Zot-Dispatch is its configuration file which allows for easier setup for your system and gives more flexibility in controlling how Zot-Dispatch is used and for what purposes.

If you are a user interested in taking advantage of what ZD has to offer, then we suggest you first understand the following background material:

Background Material

If you understand the above material and you like to get started using Zot-Dispatch, read the following:

The Basics

More Topics

After you have covered and understood the above information, continue with the following topics which describe more of Zot-Dispatch's capabilities.

You can use Zot-Dispatch's capabilities to create forms that can do any number of things. Below are described some applications of Zot-Dispatch and some tricks you can use to help Zot-Dispatch work more effectively for your needs.

Tricks, Applications, and Examples

If you are interested in setting up a copy of Zot-Dispatch for use on your server, then read on:

Server Side Details of Zot-Dispatch

Setting Up Zot-Dispatch

  1. Download a copy of Zot-Dispatch and place it in your cgi-bin directory.
  2. Make sure it is executable by the server.
  3. Download a copy of cgi-lib.pl and place it in an appropriate place. The location must be specified in Zot-Dispatch's configuration file.
  4. Install a copy of libwww-perl (If you want Zot-Dispatch to be able to retrieve templates via HTTP).
  5. Download the sample configuration file, name it zd.conf, and place it in your cgi-bin directory.
  6. Edit zd.conf in order to configure Zot-Dispatch.
  7. Create the log file specified in the configuration file (if necessary) and set the appropriate file access permissions for it so that the server can write to the file.
Please be aware of the incompatibilities between Zot-Dispatch versions 1.0 and 2.0.

If you have any questions regarding Zot-Dispatch, or if you encounter problems with its use, please e-mail lmegliol@uci.edu.
Zot-Dispatch
Written by Leonard Megliola III (lmegliol@uci.edu)
Last Revised 02 January 1996