Foundation Dynamic Web Pages with Python

Discover the concepts of creating dynamic web pages (HTML) with Python. This book reviews several methods available to serve up dynamic HTML including CGI, SSI, Django, and Flask. 

You will start by covering HTML pages and CSS in general and then move on to creating pages via CGI. It is easy to use and can serve as a foundation for the more advanced services available for launching dynamic web pages. Next you’ll explore the SSI (Server Side Interface) method. This is a slightly more advanced interface included in mots web servers that adds functionality to modify static HTML pages to add such things as the current date or time, include additional HTML, and other features to a static web page before it is delivered to the user. 

The book also covers some of the key the Django module features, which must be added to the web server. These features include creating dynamic web pages and calling a database to provide additional information to the web page. Lastly you will explore the Flask module. While it has limited functionality on its own, it provides a very flexible environment to create a self designed system for delivery of dynamic web pages.

By the time you finish this book, you will be able to choose the appropriate methodology for delivering dynamic information using fast HTML creation services.

What You’ll Learn

• Use HTML pages and CSS together to control the style of your web site.
• Install and configure SSI, Django, and Flask for Apache.
• Create dynamic web pages using CGI and creating a library of partial HTML pages to use in this task.
• Build dynamic web pages using SSI and auxiliary Python programs to enhance the SSI functionality.
• Develop dynamic web pages using Django.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction to Web Servers

Chapter 2: HTML Pages and CSS

Chapter 3: Using CGI and Python

Chapter 4: Using SSI and Python

Chapter 5: Using Flask and Jinja

Chapter 6: Django

Chapter 7: Comparing CGI, SSI, Flask, and Django

Who This Book Is For

Software Developers with basic Python programming skills interested in learning Web Development 

About the Author

W. David Ashley is a technical writer for SkillSoft where he specializes in open source, particularly Linux. As a member of the Linux Fedora documentation team he recently led the Libvert project documentation, and wrote the Python programs included with it. He has developed in 20 different programming languages during his 30 years as a software developer and IT consultant, including more than 18 years at IBM and 12 years with American Airlines.