Many people have found it useful to add server side programs called CGI to their web pages. These CGI tid bits allow you to add web counters and other features to your web pages. DataCruz currently offers the opportunity to add a basic counter to your page, a graphic counter, and the DataCruz search system that can be found by going to our Places To Visit page. If you have CGI of your own that you would like added or made available for use, please send a copy to webmaster@datacruz.com for evaluation. We accept only Unix based CGI programs written in either Perl (versions 4 or 5) or C. We do not guarantee that we will use or approve the use of any CGI program submitted. All programs must be public domain and usable by all users. Currently under development we have a form output mailer for public use.

Below we have the names of basic CGI packages available and the HTML that you need to include in your web page to use them.  In order for these two scripts to work properly, the extension of that file must be .html. However, you may use a graphical-style counter with a .htm extension.

Counter	<!--# include virtual="/cgi-bin/counter"-->
Search System	<!--# include virtual="/cgi-bin/search_engines"-->

1. Select what type of counter you want to have.
   The next step is placing the code for the counter in your HTML. This is done in a simple <img src> tag, and should be fairly easy to do.
   
   
2. Put <img src="/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?"> in your HTML code.
   Now, in between the question mark (?) and the quote (") is where we want to define the special things that make our counter look better. The first thing after the question mark (?) is what your datafile will be called where the information for the number of hits will be stored. This can be something simple like counter.dat, or datafile.dat. Remeber to have the extension be .dat and to leave it in all lower case to avoid confusion later.
   
   
3. Insert df=datafile.dat into the <img src> tag after the question mark (?).
   <img src="/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?df=datafile.dat">
   Next, we will want to choose what the style of our counter is. After df=datafile.dat, you'll need to put a &dd= immediately following it, and then the style of the counter you previously wrote down.  The counter will not work if the style does not exist.
   
   
4. Insert &dd= after your filename, and then type in the name of the counter style.
   <img src="/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?df=datafile.dat&dd=style">
   Finally, there are other small things you can do to customize your counter. These don't have to be added, but they can make things look a lot better. They are added the same way as the &dd=style is added, simply by adding another & followed by the option you want to alter, and how you want to alter it. Some other things you may like to change are as follows:
   
   
   • &ft=number
     number represents the frame thickness of the Counter.
     
     
   • &frgb=color
     color represents the color of the frame.
     
     
   • &comma=T or F  
     True or False that comma's will be displayed after every 3rd number from the right.