Processing a HTTP Request

The process has been touched on in The Adept Server Model. Here I'ill document the raw and specific data.

• Each request has complete ownership of their own thread until they respond again to the server.
• You can turn request logs on so that each request is written to the log in full before processing.
• In debug mode, no request is cached in either the browser or the server, so you can change files and see the results immediately.
• If the request URL ends in a slash (/), the default actions are explored immediately; otherwise an action is looked for as:
  • If the file type is registered against a servlet by the server, that servlet is run. The standard system registeres js for Javascript and cgi for CGI; or
  • If the file type is registed by the browser (as part of the request as a mime type) the file is sent directly to the browser for processing. Examples of these are html, gif and jpg; or
  • The request of for a servlet. If the request includes a stop (.), it is considered a defined method in the servlet class, otherwise, the default execute() method is called. Typically an application will use the default execute() for loading the page and defined methods as responses to links and form posts. The servlet method to call can optionally be set with an _action parameter instead.
• If no action is found so far the default actions are explored, treating the URL as a directory or path.
  • A servlet called Index in the package specified by the path. The execute() method is called.
  • A script or program called index.cgi. For unix based systems it will be marked executable. For Windows, cgi needs to be associated with an interpreter.
  • A static html document called index.html
  • A static html document called index.htm