Well, take cover, network managers, because the replacement for CGI is storming your way, thanks to IBM Corp.'s WebSphere Application Server (code-named Hurricane).

WebSphere is a Java application server for Java servlets, which run on your Web server and effectively replace your old C and Perl CGI scripts. Java servlets give you more flexibility and better performance--a boon for large-scale Web sites that offer end users a host of interactive functions.

We recently tested a final release of ServletExpress (a component of WebSphere) in Network Computing's Syracuse University Real-World Labs®. Although the product is compatible with any common Web server, we were disappointed to learn that you must purchase the entire WebSphere application (complete with IBM's Web server) even if you intend to use your existing Web server.

WebSphere is built entirely on open standards, including CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture), JDBC (Java Database Connectivity) and Java, so that developers can take advantage of Java's write-once, run-anywhere concept. WebSphere also replaces traditional CGI development with Java servlets, which are very similar to Java applets, except they run on the server rather than the client. Some applications, such as a redirect script, which must run on a server, traditionally have been implemented using CGI scripts.

But, WebSphere changes all this, letting you implement similar or advanced applications on the server using the Java programming language. The advantage of Java servlets on servers with tremendous traffic is that they can execute quickly, as the servlets are invoked as threads in a single process.

WebSphere Application Server includes four components: IBM's Domino Go Web Server, connectors to any CORBA support, the JDBC database and ServletExpress. ServletExpress is the core of WebSphere and its most unique feature. It takes a standard Web application server and turns it into a Java-enabled Web application server. ServletExpress works with most of the major Web application servers you're likely to find in use today. WebSphere helps take the worry out of Web administration, letting you spend more time developing sophisticated applications and less time fretting about the CPU burden they will create on your server.

Thunderous Capabilities We tested a final release of ServletExpress on a Windows NT Server running Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Information Server (IIS) 4.0 in the lab. During the installation, we experienced some difficulties getting the IIS plug-in up and running.

When we reported back to IBM that its documentation did not address this as a potential problem, its tech support there suggested that we turn off all the IIS services except the IIS admin. Afterward, the product was easy to set up, and we found ourselves ready to go in no time.

Space to Work ServletExpress is a multithreaded application that runs within the same process space as the Web server on which it is running. While this affords several performance advantages, ServletExpress can also crash your Web server and take it by storm. (Could this help explain why IBM initially dubbed the server "Hurricane?") Regardless, we were pleased to find that we were able to install ServletExpress on IIS 4.0 within the same process or as a separate outside process.

In the lab, implementing servlets within WebSphere proved to be very simple. We wrote several servlets that outputted standard HTML documents. After writing the servlets, we compiled and moved them into the servlet root directory (a virtual directory within IIS). And running the servlets was a breeze; all we had to do was open up the correct URL within our Web browsers.

Jeffrey Rubin is an adjunct professor for Syracuse University and a consultant for Internet Consulting Services. He can be reached at jhrubin@istweb.syr.edu. Ricardo Reimundez is an independent consultant based in Syracuse, N.Y. He can be reached at ricardo@reimundez.com.