[WEB4LIB] Script to execute a program

[Peter C. Gorman]

At 8:04 AM -0500 6/24/99, Jon Horstman wrote:
>Does anyone know how to set up a web page that will enable users to
>click a button in order to run an .exe file, or any other software
>program, from a CD-ROM? This sounds like a job for Javascript to me. We
>have a business CD station with 10 CDs and an equivilent web site listed
>for each one. We want to make a web page that users can access both CDs
>and web sites from a single interface.

You can check http://www.library.wisc.edu/help/tech/launch_info.html for
our approach to this, developed several years ago. That document describes
a utility called W3Launch that has not been updated for some time, but it
should still be functional. Last year we replaced W3Launch with a WinBatch
script we wrote to do the same thing: read documents with a custom MIME
type, and use that information to launch specific applications. I'm not
sure whether JavaScript's security would let you launch executables on the
client machine.

PG
_______________________________
Peter C. Gorman
Automation Librarian
University of Wisconsin-Madison
General Library System
Library Technology Group
pcgorman at facstaff.wisc.edu
(608) 265-5291

Fiddle, n. An instrument to tickle human ears by friction of a horse's
tail on the entrails of a cat.

Ambrose Bierce, _The Devil's Dictionary_