Electronic Books

??‘
??‘
??‘
??‘
??‘
??‘
??‘
226
Part II: Server Side, JavaScript, and Flash; Oh My!
What Is a Web Server?
A web server is both an application and a personal computer (PC) configured to serve web contents. A web
server application is an executable that resides in the PC memory and waits for requests on the HTTP
(Hypertext Transfer Protocol) communication channel. When such a request is received, the web server
analyzes the input and tries to produce a suitable response; this can be transmitting an existing file
available on the server, such as an image or a static document, or delegating the execution of some
script/bytecode to an interpreter and sending back to the client the result of such an operation. The most
traditional client for the HTTP protocol is the web browser, although it surely is not the only one. From
now on, client software will be referred as user agents. They can span from modern Internet browsers
such as Firefox, Safari, or Internet Explorer to search engine robots harvesting information to collect.


Pages:
418 419 420 421 422 423 424 425 426 427 428 429 430 431 432 433 434 435 436 437 438 439 440 441 442