[Xitami] Bug in HTTP error msg handling? But with "root" change?

[Cav22]

I am currently running Xitami v2.5b4 and I have no problem with yourthird
problem u addressed in this email.  I am also using XP mine is Pro version.
I dont think that shoudl matter though.  I still have yet to try the error
problems you refered to but will try to check in to those to see if the
problems occur for me as well.  When changeing your main HTML directory you
can either enter the complete path to the directory you would like (eg.
c:/webroot/) or if the directoy exists within the Xitami directory you can
directly refer to it (eg. if the desired directory is c:\Xitami\webroot the
Main HTML directory could either be the direct path or ./webroot). I tried
both of these methods and both worked for me.  Hope this helps somewhat.

Ryan Heaton
cav22@cav22.net

-----Original Message-----
From: xitami-admin@lists.xitami.org
[mailto:xitami-admin@lists.xitami.org]On Behalf Of Todd Greene
Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 4:55 PM
To: xitami@lists.xitami.org
Subject: [Xitami] Bug in HTTP error msg handling? But with "root"
change?


Hi, fellow Xitami users.

I'm a brand spankin' new user of the Xitami web server
program. After spending about three days surfing for
information about various HTTP server alternatives
(and trying out, but quickly dropping, one of them
other than Xitami), I've been playing with Xitami now
for the last three days.

I've installed the Windows version (i.e., not console,
not NT service) on a Windows XP system, and it is
Xitami v2.5b4 that I'm using.

I will mention these items that I believe are bugs in
the coding. I say that I believe these are bugs,
because I've banged my head against the program quite
a bit and not been able to get it to work the way I
believe it is supposed to following the documentation
- but, of course, I could be wrong and the problems
could simply be due to my own "novicehood" with the
program.

There are three problems that I will bring up here:
(1) Setting the "use-error-script" using the
browser-based configuration screen (for "Errors"), (2)
Use of the defined error messages (e.g.,
"@errors/text-404.htm"), and (3) Changing the web
server "root" from "webpages" to something else.

Here is the problem behavior I have noted:

(1) When you bring up the browser-based Xitami
Administration screen, then click on Configuration,
then click on Errors, there is a check box for "Use
message template script?" I have noted that when I
check this box, and press the save button, that act of
saying "Xitami, I want to use the message template
script" is NOT being saved to the defaults.cfg file.
Of course, there is a manual work-around for this in
that you can simply add the following line to the
[Server] section using your text editor:

   use-error-script = "1"

But this seems to be a clear bug in this version of
Xitami (v2.5b4), with respect to the browser-based
configuration screen (but not with the server itself).

Please note that when I set the use-error-script to
"1" (i.e., turn it on), then the server DOES use the
template file "errors.gsl", as it is supposed to.

(2) The documentation (the Configuration page) states,
and the relevent browser-based Admin screen (Errors)
implies, that Xitami is supposed to use the files such
as "@errors/header.htm", "@errors/text-404.htm", and
"@errors/footer.htm" to report errors (when
"use-error-script" is turned off), but in no case can
I get this to work. For example, with a 404 error, I
simply get the default IE Explorer 404 HTTP error
page. I ever seen the message from the
"@errors/text-404.htm" file. Again, I don't know
whether I'm doing something wrong or if this is a bug
in the program.

(3) I played around a bit with changing the name of
the root directory for the web server, and I
discovered that when I did this, then the server DID
use the specified directory BUT a directory by the
name of "webpages" (the default) still HAD TO exist or
the server would claim that the root directory did not
exist. This seems to me to be a clear bug in the code.

The way I discovered this problem and this behavior is
that I had configured the server (with the "webpages"
parameter in the [Server] section) to use a root
directory named "webroot" and then I directly altered
the name of the original "webpages" directory itself.
Thus, a directory named "webpages" did not exist at
all. The server would then keep telling me that I had
no home page (a 404 error) even though it clearly DID
exist (all I had done was changed the name of the
default root directory to something else and then
pointed to this new name in the configuration file
(defaults.cfg). After trying out all kinds of things
and scratching my head for over an hour I hit on the
idea of creating a directory with the name "webpages"
(with absolutely nothing in it), and - ta da! - the
server worked like a charm, using the "index.html"
file I had in my "webroot" directory.

Has anyone else had these problems? Have these issues
been addressed in a newer version of Xitami? Version
2.5b4 was the latest version that I was able to
download from the website. As I'm working with Xitami,
I'm finding that I like this program, and I would like
to work with anyone I need to to help get the errors
that I notice fixed.

(FYI, FWIW, I've been a programmer since the late
1970s, and I've been using C++ for the last 7 years,
and just recently I've been motivated to dig into
doing some serious CGI programming using C++ and Perl
(and perhaps PHP?) for web applications. I use dial-up
from home, but I need a web server running on my home
computer to provide myself with a test bed. I have
also downloaded MySQL and am in the middle of setting
this up on my home computer. My motivation for this is
that I've been laid off from the company I worked for,
in a serious downsizing, and job prospects have been
bleak, so web apps are something I'm starting to work
on as a possibility of drumming up some home business
income.)

Regards,
Todd S. Greene
greeneto@yahoo.com

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