NAME
Apache::PrettyText - Simple mod_perl PerlHandler for text files
SYNOPSIS
## In httpd.conf:
<Perl>
use Apache::PrettyText;
</ Perl> ## <-- Omit the space if you copy this example.
<Files ~ "\.txt$">
SetHandler perl-script
PerlHandler Apache::PrettyText
</Files>
To modify your Apache server to dynamically format .txt files so they look nicer in the client's browser, put the following directives into httpd.conf, or in any VirtualHost section and restart the server.
Optional: Insert a <Perl> section that changes $Apache::PrettyText::TabWidth to your site's standard or set to 0 to disable detabbing. If you don't set it, the default is 4.
## In httpd.conf:
<Perl>
$Apache::PrettyText::TabWidth = 4;
</ Perl> ## <-- Omit the space if you copy this example.
You must be using mod_perl. See http://perl.apache.org for details.
DESCRIPTION
This is a simple Apache handler written in Perl that converts text files on the fly into a basic HTML format:
surrounded by <PRE> tags
tabs converted to spaces (optional)
white background
hilited URLs
first line of text file = <TITLE>
Also serves as a good template to help you write your own simple
handler. I wrote this as an exercise because I found no good examples.
INSTALLATION
Using CPAN module:
perl -MCPAN -e 'install Apache::PrettyText'
Or manually:
tar xzvf Apache-PrettyText*gz
cd Apache-PrettyText-1.??
perl Makefile.PL
make
make test
make install
If you're reading this in pod or man, it's already installed. If you're reading the source code in PrettyText.pm, you can copy this file under the name "PrettyText.pm" into this location:
/usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/Apache/
... or its equivalent on your computer.
A helpful tip: you can include the entire contents of the PrettyText.pm file or of your own version of it into a <Perl> section within httpd.conf. This can be very helpful if you'd like to use this module as a template for your own.
To syntax-check your code under those circumstances, use:
perl -cx httpd.conf
... which will read just the perl code between #!...perl and __END__ in the httpd.conf file.
AUTHOR
Chris Thorman <chthorman@cpan.org>
Copyright (c) 1995-2002 Chris Thorman. All rights reserved.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.
SEE ALSO
Apache(3), mod_perl, http://perl.apache.org/src/contrib
The Apache::PrettyText home page:
http://christhorman.com/projects/perl/Apache-PrettyText/
The implementation in PrettyText.pm.
THANKS
Thanks to Vivek Khera, Doug MacEachern, Jeffrey William Baker for suggestions and corrections.