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What is htmc?

htmc is a tool that allows you to easily integrate C code in your HTML pages and vice versa. Files ending in .htmc can be used to describe the structure of a page statically in HTML and dynamically in C, much like other hypertex preprocessors such as PHP. Regular C source files can also be compiled with htmc and used to generate fully dynamic web pages.

Why use htmc?

htmc uses GCC and the GNU Linker to generate highly optimized native binaries that can be cached and run on demande via htmc. In theory, this allows for much faster execution* compared to many common interpreted languages like PHP, Python, and JavaScript.

Writing web code in C can also be a fun challenge or academic exercise. Given enough tinkering, you can get htmc to do everything you need in a dynamic web page or HTTP API endpoint.

* The performance of code executed through htmc has not been tested yet. Also, most important optimizations have yet to be implemented as they stricly require htmc to integrate a web server of its own.

Ways to use htmc

htmc is built to support multiple usecases. As of now, htmc can be used:

  1. As a CLI tool
  2. As a CGI script
  3. As a static library (using headers from the include directory and libhtmc.a)

The recommended mode for serving web content is CGI as it allows for easy integration with existing web software.

Integrated web server

CGI is known to be old and slow, hence why htmc will get its own web server at some point. The integrated web server will use preallocated arenas, memory and network optimizations to maximize execution speed and minimize overhead, hopefully.

How to use htmc easily

Requirements
  • Modern GCC Compiler or equivilent
  • Decently recent version of the GNU Linker or equivilent
  • GNU + Linux or other compatible Linux-based systems

NOTE: As of now replacing GCC or GNU Linker with other software is not encouraged. Some commandline options specified by htmc may be different in other compilers/linkers.

How to use libhtmc

libhtmc contains all htmc functions. The library can be used in other native programs to integrate htmc, but also includes an interface to interact with the htmc runtime and manipulate HTML code

Function interface Description
void htmc_bind(htmc_handover_t *handover) Binds an htmc_handover_t pointer to the current htmc execution unit
int htmc_printf(const char *fmt, ...) Writes a formatted string to the HTML page
int htmc_vpprintf(const char *fmt, va_list args) Writes a formatted string to the HTML page
int htmc_puts(const cahr *s) Write a plain-text string to the HTML page (faster than htmc_printf)
int htmc_query_scanf(const char *fmt, ...) Reads values from HTTP query arguments
int htmc_query_vscanf(const char *fmt, va_list args) Reads values from HTTP query arguments
int htmc_form_scanf(const char *fmt, ...) Reads values from HTTP body arguments in POST requests
int htmc_form_vscanf(const char *fmt, va_list args) Reads values from HTTP body arguments in POST requests
int htmc_error(const char *fmt, ...) Throws a formatted error message
void *htmc_alloc(size_t size) Returns a void * to a memory buffer of the requested size or NULL if it fails
void htmc_free(void *ptr) Frees a memory buffer allocated with htmc_alloc

CGI web server

The easiest way to use htmc is to create a simple CGI web server in a high level language and invoke htmc when handling requests. In this example, Golang is used as it's one of the simplest native languages that supports these features out of the box. A Golang web server is included in this repository.

  1. Downlaod the latest htmc-cgi-ws for Linux from here
  2. Create a directory for the server and move htmc-cgi-ws into it
  3. Make sure that htmc-cgi-ws is recognized as an executable
chmod +x ./htmc-cgi-ws
  1. Run htmc-cgi-ws as super user (if needed) and follow the instructions on screen
[alevm@alevm ws]$ sudo ./htmc-cgi-ws 
You're missing some important htmc files, proceed with the download? [Y/n]: Y
Downloading <https://alessandro-salerno.github.io/htmc/bin/htmc> to ./bin/htmc ... Done!
Downloading <https://alessandro-salerno.github.io/htmc/bin/libhtmc.a> to ./bin/libhtmc.a ... Done!
Downloading <https://alessandro-salerno.github.io/htmc/include/libhtmc/libhtmc.h> to ./include/libhtmc/libhtmc.h ... Done!
Downloading <https://alessandro-salerno.github.io/htmc/examples/index.htmc> to ./index.htmc ... Done!
Listening on localhost:80
  1. An example page should now be available at localhost/index.htmc

How to build htmc

Requirements
  • C compiler compatible with C23 (C2x)
  • Linker that supports LTO
  • Make
  • Go
Expected behaviour 
Compiling for linux
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/cli.c -o obj/common/cli.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/compile.c -o obj/common/compile.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/emit.c -o obj/common/emit.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.c -o obj/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.c -o obj/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.c -o obj/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/load.c -o obj/common/load.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/log.c -o obj/common/log.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/main.c -o obj/common/main.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/parse.c -o obj/common/parse.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -flto -c src/common/util.c -o obj/common/util.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/cli.c -o lib/common/cli.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/compile.c -o lib/common/compile.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/emit.c -o lib/common/emit.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.c -o lib/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.c -o lib/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.c -o lib/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/load.c -o lib/common/load.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/log.c -o lib/common/log.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/main.c -o lib/common/main.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/parse.c -o lib/common/parse.o
gcc -O2 -std=c2x -Wno-unused-parameter -Iinclude/ -DEXT_HTMC_BUILD=""24.10.09"" -fPIC -g -w -c src/common/util.c -o lib/common/util.o
gcc -flto obj/common/cli.o obj/common/compile.o obj/common/emit.o obj/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.o obj/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.o obj/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.o obj/common/load.o obj/common/log.o obj/common/main.o obj/common/parse.o obj/common/util.o -o bin/htmc
ar rcs bin/libhtmc.a lib/common/cli.o lib/common/compile.o lib/common/emit.o lib/common/libhtmc/impl/base-impl.o lib/common/libhtmc/impl/debug-impl.o lib/common/libhtmc/libhtmc.o lib/common/load.o lib/common/log.o lib/common/main.o lib/common/parse.o lib/common/util.o
cd cgi-ws && go build -o ../bin/htmc-cgi-ws
Finished!
alessandrosalerno@MacBook-Pro-di-Alessandro-3 htmc %
  1. Clone this repository
git clone https://github.com/Alessandro-Salerno/htmc
  1. Enter the repository's directory
cd htmc/
  1. Use the make command to build htmc
make

NOTE: The default make target is all. Alternative make targets are:

make htmc         # Build ONLY the executable
make libhtmc      # Build ONLY the library
make htmc-cgi-ws  # Build ONLY the CGI Web Server

Screenshot

License

htmc is distributed under the terms of the MIT license. See LICENSE for more information.

Credits

This project was initially inspired by PKD667/cweb.

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