How do I use apache2gdl with XAMPP on Windows 7?

Question

This is a question for all Apache/Perl gurus out there. Is it possible to try out Apache2GDL on XAMPP in a Windows 7 environment? If so, what are the steps?

So far I have put the apache2gdl.pl file in my cgi-bin directory, but how do I run the script on Windows 7? This is how they want you to run it:

> cat <log file> | apache2gdl.pl [URL pattern] > <graph file>

log file is /logs/access.log and URL is localhost and graph file is graph.gdl , I guess. I'm a total noob on this so please bear with me.

Answer 1

Take it out of the cgi-bin directory, the program is not a CGI program. Run it from the command prompt.

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No wonder you are confused, the instructions on their site are terrible. This is the result of absent-minded documentation efforts, lack of a style guide, not bothering to take great documentation as a role model and learning from it.

> cat <log file> | apache2gdl.pl [URL pattern] > <graph file>

The first > indicates the shell prompt. You are not supposed to type that.

The pairs of <…> indicate a placeholder. It is a bad idea to use them because they conflict with the other uses I mention immediately above and below. They should have been using […] all along, or better using a different typographic convention which has no chance at all to cause conflict through multiple possible ways to read.

The last (single) > is a piece of real shell syntax. Its meaning is to redirect the output from the apache2gdl.pl program into a file.

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Eliminating the useless use of cat , I would write the synopsis this way, once with abstract placeholders and once with concrete example data:

perl apache2gdl.pl URL_PATTERN < LOG_FILE > GRAPH_FILE

perl apache2gdl.pl example.com/foo/bar < /logs/access.log > graph.gdl