Aquila wrote:
>>mod_ruby doesn't have to be used to create a webapp, you know :-)
> 
> I don't understand it, you need some sort of layer on top of apache to use
> server sided scripting with apache, and if you don't you can use webrick or
> some other stand alone http server, right?

What I meant was that, mod_ruby is a tool that binds Ruby to Apache. You 
can of course use mod_ruby to create web applications (i.e. generate 
dynamic HTML/XHTML pages with Ruby interpreter embedded inside Apache). 
But you can also use mod_ruby for other purposes than generating dynamic 
pages (e.g. for an admin like me, mod_ruby makes Apache more useful 
because I can extend it easily with Ruby code. This way Ruby works 
behind the layer and doesn't always have anything to do page generation 
at all).

So it's not always appropriate to compare mod_ruby with FastCGI or even 
rails. They do different things.

>>I use 
>>mod_ruby to customize & extend Apache behaviour (e.g. custom URL
>>mapping, URL filtering, and flexible wrapped CGI execution). It's so
>>much easier and faster using Ruby to create Apache modules instead of C.
> 
> You are writing your own mod_filtering etc? That sounds really interesting.
> Can I find your code somewhere?

Sorry, much of it is internal stuffs. I used to use mod_perl though, and 
there are many examples (even books) for that. Most of them can be 
applied pretty easily for mod_ruby too.

>>Oh and I use plain Ruby CGI and FastCGI too.
> 
> By plain Ruby CGI you mean Ruby on top of "regular" Apache CGI? 

Yes. (It doesn't always have to be Apache, of course. CGI is a generic 
protocol that's supported by most webservers).

> To end a message from a confused person: I do understand what you mean by
> FastCGI...
> 
> Thanks for the information!

You're welcome!

--
dave