Web Hosting Glossary

CGI-bin / Perl

CGI refers to the Common Gateway Interface.

CGI is a scripting language (similar to C programming) used to write gateway scripts for CERN and NCSA web servers. CGI programs are the most common way for web servers to interact dynamically with users.

Many HTML pages that contain forms, for example, use a CGI program to process the form's user input.

CGI-bin is the file directory in your web hosting account where CGI scripts are commonly stored.

CGI is sometimes refered to as Perl, which is basically the same.

All web hosting companies provide use of CGI with their accounts. If a company you're looking at does not provide CGI, then you should re-consider the buy as you'll miss out on the ability to run CGI/Perl scripts.