NAME Finance::Shares::CGI - support for Finance::Shares cgi interface scripts

SYNOPSIS

The perl module

    use Finance::Shares::CGI;

    my $cgi = new Finance::Shares::CGI;
    my $db  = $cgi->get_records( param('s') );

    $cgi->print_header($title, $text, $script, $style);
    $cgi->print_form_start($url, $code, $centered);
    $cgi->print_form_end();
    $cgi->print_footer($text);

    $cgi->show_params();
    $cgi->show_hash($hashref);
    $cgi->show_records();

Administration scripts

    init.pl
    fetch.pl
    list.pl
    drop.pl

User registration scripts

    register.pl
    email.pl
    password.pl
    login.pl
    logout.pl

Main processing scripts

    browser.pl
    chart.pl
    interface.pl
    menu.pl
    options.pl
    prefs.pl
    run.pl

Support scripts

    make_cmdline
    make_index
    strip_cgi

DESCRIPTION

The Finance::Shares::CGI module supports a number of cgi scripts which provide a web interface to the Finance::Shares toolkit. It requires a mysql database. See Finance::Shares::Overview or Finance::Shares::MySQL for details on setting this up.

The scripts must be manually copied to your CGI directory. See the README file for installation details. This documents how the scripts work together.

Administration scripts

These scripts are only available to an admin user.

init.pl

Builds the mysql database. Mysql must have a user, password and database to match those set in MarketMonkey.pm. Documentation is available using

    $ perldoc init.pl

Note that tables, users or sessions arguments all destroy user data.

fetch.pl

Fetches stock quotes into the mysql database. Remember the command line scripts fs_fetch and fs_fetch_csv can be found in the Finance::Shares package.

list.pl

Lists the mysql table names against the DBIx::Namespace user names. Remember fs_list_tables in Finance::Shares.

drop.pl

Small changes to the tables can be made from the mysql prompt. DON'T just delete tables, though, as this destroys the index integrity. It only deletes one user-name at a time. Use list.pl to identify them. This does the same job as fs_drop_table from the Finance::Shares package.

User registration scripts

I realise this is a bit heavy handed for a demo, but I haven't got around to taking it out yet.

register.pl

Starts registration process for new user. Emails a link to password.pl

email.pl

Emails user name and password hint to user.

password.pl

Completes registration.

login.pl

Checks for user id and starts a session.

logout.pl

Ends a session. Sessions may also expire; logging in is required daily.

Main processing scripts

These are the scripts which serve the site's main purpose, to make the hundreds of options more manageable.

options.pl

Top of site, this generates the frameset holding menu and content frames.

menu.pl

Generates the menu according to session browser settings

interface.pl

The main script, driven by params 't' (table name), 'a' (arguments) and 'name' (of user settings) which determine the layout described in the init.pl tables.

browser.pl

User override of browser settings. There is support for dhtml but it is currently disabled. (It wasn't worth the bother.)

prefs.pl

Help and option levels for user. There are three user levels, mostly done, but the three help levels are all the same at present.

chart.pl

Generates PostScript chart from 'Draw chart' settings.

run.pl

Runs a model and returns a chart with the results.

Support scripts

make_cmdline

This creates a user called 'cmdline' with the password 'cmdL193'. It also creates a session with id 'cmdline' - a lot easier to type than a 32 character digest. This needs to be given each day as the session expires, but it does make command line testing possible.

You will probably want to copy the strip_cgi script to your cgi directory before issuing manual commands like:

    run.pl 's=cmdline' 'name=model1' | strip_cgi > outfile.ps

The first time you try this there will probably be a write error, because run.pl and chart.pl write a file vars which is probably not owned by you. Delete it and try again.

This vars file can be used as a basis for manual tests. I find it simplest to get test data from CSV files, so a source line needs manually adding to each sample:

  'samples' => {
    'ulvr1' => {
      'source' => 't/08-ulvr.csv',      # Added manually
      'symbol' => 'ULVR.L',
      'end_date' => '2002-08-31',
      'dates_by' => 'days',
      'userid' => '-1',
      'name' => 'ulvr1',
      'start_date' => '2002-06-01'
    }
  },

Occasionally a 1; needs adding on the end as the file is read by do. If the changed vars file is now saved as test1.txt, the following command should produce the same result:

    run.pl 'test_in=test1.txt' | strip_cgi > outfile.ps

The main difference is that this test mode avoids any mysql accesses, so can be used for installation tests before the database is set up.

make_index

Constructs the file index.html using the same settings as all the cgi scripts.

strip_cgi

A filter converting script output to a viewable (PostScript or HTML) file.

The HTML written to STDOUT by the scripts have a CGI header prepended. Piping the output through strip_cgi produces a file which can be saved and viewed with a postscript viewer such as gv or KGhostView.