CGI Perl scripts crashes unexpectedly under Windows

[sosed]

Hi!

I've been developing a PERL CGI script under Windows.
I'm using ActiveState's PERL 5.6 and also DBI & DBD::ODBC to gain access
to my database.

I'm sending a long query string from the client (i.e. after ?), which
sometimes contains more than one value for some parameter (i.e. a=1&a=2 etc.).
I noticed that sometimes (when the URL is of a certain length) the script
crushes, bringing up the usual Windows-style message "Your application
has performed an illegal operation... bla bla bla" for the Perl interpreter.
The Web-page being generated by the script in this case is missing, and
as a result I get the famous "Internal Server Error 500" message.

What can I do? I tried to run this script from the command line (without
reading from the standard input, i.e. no CGI), with the same crash-causing
query string hard-coded - and it doesn't crash.
What's wrong? Is it something with the memory? It's interesting, because
it crashes on both Win98 and Win2K! And only with certaing URLs, which
have nothing special in them.
Maybe it's ActiveState that sucks? Are there any other Windows Perl interpreters
I can use for my CGI scripts?

Thanks,

Alexander.

 

[Newposter]

Don't some programs or browsers have a limit of 26 characters in the URLs? Seems to me I read that awhile back. Test URLs under and over that limit and see if that's the issue. Newposter
"Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment."

 

[goBoating]

ditto on the limit of the length of the URL string. I think it is longer than 26 chars, but there is a limit(256 maybe???? I can't remember)

Give a look at the URL strings that make the app crash. 'hope this helps

If you are new to Tek-Tips, please use descriptive titles, check the FAQs, and beware the evil typo.

 

[fishiface]

Would it be possible to modify the client to use POST rather than GET? I've sent many k of info in POSTs without problems. "As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it wasn't as
easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging had to be discovered.
I can remember the exact instant when I realized that a large part of my life
from then on was going to be spent in finding mistakes in my own programs."
--Maurice Wilk

 

[c4n]

"Are there any other Windows Perl interpreters I can use for my CGI scripts?"

I've been using IndigoPerl (

http://www.indigostar.com/indigoperl.htm)

quite some time now and never had any problems.

 

[Haunter]

http://www.ActiveState.com

Much better than Indigo