As part of our ongoing efforts to improve CGI performance, we’ve begun the process of updating our CGI servers, blending our existing pooled architecture with some of the more traditional methods of Unix Web hosting.

HOW DOES THIS BENEFIT ME?
Our new configuration will produce the following benefits:

Faster fulfillment: Once you enable CGI for your account, you’ll be able to use it right away.
Better performance: CGI servers will run faster, which means so will your pages and scripts.
Quicker Issue Resolution: Should something happen to one of our CGI servers, we’ll be able to troubleshoot and resolve the issue more quickly.

WHEN WILL THIS HAPPEN?
We plan to implement the new configuration in the near future, and we’ll send an e-mail message to customers that use CGI once everything is in place. (So if you use CGI, keep your eyes on your Inbox!)

WHAT DO I NEED TO DO?
The short answer is “nothing.” You should not need to update any paths, and your scripts should continue to function as they do now. Still, there *are* some changes you should be aware of:

The new configuration adopts the more traditional (numeric) method of handling Unix file/directory permissions, and as a result, we’ve set permissions for customers’ home directories to be 750. With this permissions setting, your scripts should continue to run as they always have, and it ensures that others won’t have “write” access to your files.

Please note: If you change your home directory permissions settings to something other than 750, you may be unintentionally giving others access to change or update your files. There are certain permissions settings that could potentially constitute a security risk (examples include 666 or 777). To protect all of our customers, scripts will not execute if permissions are changed to certain settings (such as 666 or 777).