Explanation
In the earlier days of the web, server-side scripting was almost exclusively performed by using a combination of C programs, Perl scripts, and shell scripts using the Common Gateway Interface (CGI). Those scripts were executed by the operating system, and the results were served back by the web server. Many modern web servers can directly execute on-line scripting languages such as ASP and PHP either by the web server itself or via extension modules (e.g. mod_perl or mod_php) to the web server. For example, WebDNA includes its own embedded database system. Either form of scripting (i.e., CGI or direct execution) can be used to build up complex multi-page sites, but direct execution usually results in lower overhead due to the lack of calls to external interpreters.
Dynamic websites sometimes use custom web application servers, for example the Python "Base HTTP Server" library, although some may not consider this to be server-side scripting. When designing using dynamic web-based scripting technics, like classic ASP or PHP, developers must have a keen understanding of the logical, temporal, and physical separation between the client and the server. For a user's action to trigger the execution of server-side code, for example, a developer working with classic ASP must explicitly cause the user's browser to make a request back to the web server. Creating such interactions can easily consume much development time and lead to unreadable code.
Read more about this topic: Server-side Scripting
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