Oracle WebServer User's Guide

Components of the Oracle Web Agent

The Oracle Web Agent is a CGI program that the Web Listener executes when a request is received for a dynamic document. This program logs into the database and executes stored PL/SQL procedures that have been specified as part of the URL.

To facilitate the development of PL/SQL for the Web Agent, a WebServer Developer's Toolkit is provided. This toolkit includes the following packages:

HTP (hypertext procedures) and HTF (hypertext functions) ease the generation of HTML tags from within the user's PL/SQL code. HTP and HTF automatically generate the HTML tags retrieved by the Oracle Web Agent.

OWA_UTIL contains utility functions to enable the programmer to more rapidly build HTML output.

Note: The Web Agent also includes a PL/SQL package called OWA that contains utility functions called by the Web Agent to do such things as set up the CGI environment variables and extract the output generated by the PL/SQL code from a PL/SQL table. A PL/SQL developer does not make calls to the OWA package directly, although it can be called from a URL and, therefore, directly by a user..

For detailed information about the Oracle WebServer Developer's Toolkit, see Chapter 6. For information on the WebServer Administration Utility for administering the Web Agent, see Chapter 7, "Oracle WebServer Administration Utility."