We offer a variety of solutions for deploying COBOL applications on the Internet. Some allow you to make your COBOL programs
and data accessible on the Web from popular Internet browsers. Others allow you to harness the Internet in a more secure TCP/IP
networking configuration.
Following are some of the Web-based solutions available to our customers:
- Web thin client – You can add the ACUCOBOL-GT® Web Thin Client to your Web page so that when users visit your site, the thin
client downloads and installs on their machines and automatically launches your application on the server. In thin client
architectures, the application logic runs on the server. Only the user interface displays on the client.
- Web runtime – You can add the ACUCOBOL-GT Web Runtime to your Web page so that when users visit that page, the runtime downloads
and installs on their machines and automatically launches your application locally.
- COBOL CGI interface – You can create a Web interface to your COBOL application and allow users to interact with pages on your
Web site via an HTTP browser or mobile device using ACUCOBOL-GT's Common Gateway Interface (CGI) extensions.
- Internet helper application – If your users already have a licensed copy of the ACUCOBOL-GT runtime on their machine, they
can gain access to your applications on the Web by setting up the runtime as an Internet helper application or viewer inside
their browser. When they click a link on your Web site, the browser knows to associate the application with the ACUCOBOL-GT
runtime.
- Web browsing from COBOL – ACUCOBOL-GT includes a Web browser control that lets you add a variety of Internet features to your
COBOL program. With this control, your programs can support Web browsing; display HTML pages; invoke e-mail, telnet, and FTP
services; and more. You can even give your program Windows print, file, and clipboard capabilities.
- COBOL Web services – Using our Java and .NET interfaces, you can expose your COBOL applications as Web services for use in
Web services deployments.
These options are described in detail in A Programmer's Guide to the Internet, available on your product distribution media.