Spring Semester 2007

Lecture Notes Five: Writing programs that keep state.
Let's start from the basic CGI.pm-based web script. Sure enough; here it is. 
#!/usr/bin/perl

use CGI;

$q = new CGI; 

print $q->header, $q->start_html; 

print qq{
  Yo, baby!
}; 

print $q->end_html;
Today we will program a simple, fictitious card game. It's called... Phrphre-b.
You need to pronounce that in a special way. We won't spend too much time on that though.
For this game we need a deck of cards. Things of this kind?
Precisely. Well, OK; you know where to get them now.
How do you play Phrphre-b? Here's a link to get an idea.
What are the rules, then? If you follow the link you will see a picture of Dilbert and one of Ratbert.
Ratbert is the simpleminded optimist (you). Dilbert is the computer itself. You are playing against the computer.
Dilbert loves technology more than people. You are playing against the computer.
The game starts with your opponent (Dilbert) picking up a card. Then you (Ratbert) pick up a card.
You take turns until you both have 5 cards. That's when the one spanning the largest range wins the round.
Make sure you keep track of score across rounds. There is a way to reset the entire game.
Within the same round you can keep track of the current ranges. This (apart from speaking its name out loud) is a pretty simple program.
Let's develop a part of it, if not the entire program. Sure, let's first develop this program. 
#!/usr/bin/perl

use CGI; 

$q = new CGI; 

print $q->header, $q->start_html; 

$message=$q->param('message'); # done automatically by PHP 

if ($message) {

  @a = split(' ', $message); 
  $first = splice(@a, 0, 1); 
  $message = join(' ', @a); 

  $anotherMessage = "You are looking at: " . $first; 

} else { 
  @a = ("one", "two", "three", "four", "five", "six"); 
  @b = ();   

  while ($#a >= 0) { 
    $i = int(rand($#a+1)); # randomly choose one element in @a 
    splice(@b, 0, 0, $a[$i]); # put it on the left of @b 
    splice(@a, $i, 1); # ... and take it out from @a 
  } 
  $anotherMessage = "The game has just (re)started. The deck is shuffled."; 
  $message = join(' ', @b); 
} 

print qq{
  <form>
    $anotherMessage <p>
    Current list: ($message) <p>
    <input type="submit" value="Proceed">
    <input type="hidden" name="message" value="$message">
  </form>
}; 

print $q->end_html;
The entire reading assignment for today boils down to this. This is the basic framework for developing programs like the ones we're working on.

In our case we store the state in hidden fields, on the client side. Remember we always code with a plan in mind.
Updated by Adrian German for A348/A548