Soft Serve: A simple-to-use HTML server

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

This is still a work-in-progress, but I thought a brief introduction might be of interest to some. I'm not going to post the object yet, since there's still some cleanup to do, but here's a brief feature set:

• Provides a (mostly) transparent wrapper for Roy Eltham's DHCP object (as modified by Beau Schwab).
• Uses abbreviated HTML constructs for small page footprints.
• Automatically inserts linefeeds, indenting, and end tags for proper nesting and nice visual source presentation.
• Permits the embedding of string variables anywhere in the output. As the output is being generated, data are fetched from the strings, fill-in-the-blanks style.
• Has methods for request-string and HTML-source echoing for ease of debugging.
• Automatically parses GET requests into action string and key/value parameter pairs.

Here's a sample top-level program:

[font=Parallax][size=2]
CON

  _clkmode      = xtal1 + pll16x
  _xinfreq      = 5_000_000

  #$00, EOF,LEFT,CENTER,CHECKED,TEXT,SUBMIT,RESET,RADIO,BUTTON,HIDDEN,EOL,EOP,HR,SP,LI,SIZE, {
      } FIL,CHKBOX,POST,ALIGN,NAME,VALUE,CLASS,ID,STYLE_,TYPE,WIDTH,HEIGHT,COLOR,FONT,FSIZE,BKGND

  #$80, B_,I_,U_,S_,SUP_,SUB_,SPAN_,TABLE_,TR_,TD_,DIV_,FORM_,INPUT_,IMG_,URL_,LIST_, {
      } CODE_,PRE_,OLIST_,INDENT_,RESERVED2,VAR_,ATTR_,HTML_,MARK_,VAL_,_STYLE,_ATTR,_HTML,_MARK,_TAG,_ALL

  QU            = $22

  VISITOR       = 1
  TITLE_COLOR   = 2  
  
OBJ

  server        : "soft_serve"
  num           : "simple_numbers_plus"

VAR

  word  request, variables[32], visitor_no

PUB main

  server.start(string("192.168.0.50:3456"), string("192.168.0.4"), 0, string("00 08 DC 16 F0 13"))
  server.setvars(@variables)
   
  variables[TITLE_COLOR] := string("blue")
 
  repeat
    if (strcomp(request := server.request, string("/change")))
      variables[TITLE_COLOR] := server.param(string("color"))
    else
      variables[TITLE_COLOR] := string("blue")
    variables[VISITOR] := num.dec(++visitor_no)
    server.html_page(string("Color Change Test"), 0, string("#fffff0"))
    server.html_content(@change)
    server.end_html_page
       
DAT

change  byte  IMG_,"http://forums.parallax.com/image.php?u=45432",_ATTR
        byte  HR,DIV_,ALIGN,CENTER,COLOR,VAR_,TITLE_COLOR,FSIZE,"20pt",FONT,"sans-serif",_ATTR,B_
        byte  "This title is colored ",VAR_,TITLE_COLOR,".",_ALL,HR
        byte  DIV_,CENTER,WIDTH,"400",BKGND,"#e0e0d0;margin:auto auto;padding:12pt;border:solid ",VAR_,TITLE_COLOR," 1px",_ATTR
        byte  FORM_,"/change",_ATTR,"Enter a new color here: "
        byte  INPUT_,TEXT,NAME,"color",VALUE,VAR_,TITLE_COLOR,SIZE,"10",_ATTR,"    "
        byte  INPUT_,SUBMIT,_ATTR,EOP
        byte  "You are visitor number ",VAR_,VISITOR,".",EOF 
[/size][/font]

You can give this program a try here (for awhile):

[url]phipi.homelinux.org:3456[/url]

I think I've got my firewall set right, but let me know if you can't reach it; and be sure to view the source to compare with the above DAT section.

More later...

-Phil

$WMc%

Cool PhiPi:
'
I was vistor 101

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

I got up this morning to find that the Spinneret had hung during the night, and I had to reset it. I haven't a clue what caused it to hang, since my program relies upon a peripheral chip and driver objects for it that I don't yet understand. Has anyone else experienced this with their Spinneret?

Thanks,
-Phil

John Abshier

Sometimes it worked. Sometimes I get a Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage message. IE8 on Windows 7 64 bit

John Abshier

WBA Consulting

That's really cool. I am hoping that I can eventually use a Spinneret for a few projects but do not want to have to spend time on the basics of "getting it to work" so to speak. I want to be able to modify something like what you have done here for a simple interface so that I can quickly implement these. My thought is to make a web-based real time monitoring setup for a couple machines we have on our production floor. I can already tap into the machines' status through a serial port so I just need to grab that data and shove it to the Spinneret.

ps. I tried to stump it with fuchsia for the color, but it got it!

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Thanks, Andrew! Actually, it's your browser that understands color names. My program just plugs the color typed into the box into the locations indicated in the script by the TITLE_COLOR variable, viz:

change  byte  IMG_,"http://forums.parallax.com/image.php?u=45432",_ATTR
        byte  HR,DIV_,ALIGN,CENTER,COLOR,[color=fuchsia]VAR_,TITLE_COLOR[/color],FSIZE,"20pt",FONT,"sans-serif",_ATTR,B_
        byte  "This title is colored ",[color=fuchsia]VAR_,TITLE_COLOR[/color],".",_ALL,HR
        byte  DIV_,CENTER,WIDTH,"400",BKGND,"#e0e0d0;margin:auto auto;padding:12pt;border:solid ",[color=fuchsia]VAR_,TITLE_COLOR[/color]," 1px",_ATTR
        byte  FORM_,"/change",_ATTR,"Enter a new color here: "
        byte  INPUT_,TEXT,NAME,"color",VALUE,[color=fuchsia]VAR_,TITLE_COLOR[/color],SIZE,"10",_ATTR,"    "
        byte  INPUT_,SUBMIT,_ATTR,EOP
        byte  "You are visitor number ",VAR_,VISITOR,".",EOF

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" dir="ltr" lang="en">
  <head>
    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" />
    <title>Color Change Test</title>
  </head>
  <body style="background-color: #fffff0">
    <img src="http://forums.parallax.com/image.php?u=45432"><hr/>
    <div align="center" style="color:[color=fuchsia]fuchsia[/color];font-size:20pt;font-family:sans-serif">
      <b>This title is colored [color=fuchsia]fuchsia[/color].</b>
    </div>
    <hr/>
    <div align="center" style="width:400;background-color:#e0e0d0;margin:auto auto;padding:12pt;border:solid [color=fuchsia]fuchsia[/color] 1px">
      <form method="get" action="change">
        Enter a new color here: 
        <input type="text" name="color" value="[color=fuchsia]fuchsia[/color]" size="10"> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
        <input type="submit"><p/>
        You are visitor number 94.
      </form>
    </div>
  <body>
<html>

You can also enter colors in their RGB hex format, #RRGGBB, e.g. #FFFF00 for yellow.

-Phil

Leon

FWIW, it works with my Dell Streak tablet (Android).

Beau Schwabe

Phil,

If your really using the DHCP methods in Roy's code, that's fine. I might have overstepped my boundry by taking his code and wrapping it the way I did when really I was only using it for basic. HTML ... Sorry Roy.

Attached is a bare bones 'Simple HTML.Spin' wrapper that should have been what I originally posted. this should work in place of the 'DHCP_GBSbuild_01_27_2001.spin'

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Seriously? That's all that's required? Thanks, Beau! That will simplify my job even further. BTW, for anyone trying the link, it's down for the next 24...

-Phil