nail — Sat, 04 Nov 2000 04:36:53 +0000

check out http://cgi.resourceindex.com/Remotely_Hosted/ for a big list of sites that host CGI scripts for you. hope that helps...

Edge — Sat, 04 Nov 2000 03:22:00 +0000

http://www.virtualave.net is a free webspace provider that give you your own cgi-bin. However, you have to put their banners on your page.

--Edge

Maverick — Fri, 03 Nov 2000 19:21:37 +0000

You can get free CGI access from sites that will remotely host apps for you. So if you wanted to have a forum or a guestbook or anything else that needed CGI, you'd sign up for an account with the provider. Then you'd used slightly customized versions of the apps they provide that stay running on their servers. You merely link to the pages.

The benefits:
1) Easy - No knowledge needed. Just set a few a few variables like background color and you're off and running.
2) No resources used - The programs run on the providers server, not your own. So they won't bog things down locally.
3) Available - If you have no CGI access, remotely hosted apps beat having none at all.

The downside:
1) You get what you pay for - Reliability is a big issue. Speed is usually terrible.
2) Limited customization - You're locked into using the apps they provide. You might get to set fonts and colors, but that's about it. Forget about changing things you don't like, adding additional features or getting things to work a different way.
3) Image - It looks really lowbrow when a supposedly professional site is using CGI hosted by some free provider.

For an example of what's available from a remote CGI hosting service, check out http://www.bravenet.com