How to run CGI "hello world" with python http.server

Question

I am using Windows 7 and Python 3.4.3. I would like to run this simple helloworld.py file in my browser:

print('Content-Type: text/html')
print( '<html>')
print( '<head></head>')
print( '<body>')
print( '<h2>Hello World</h2>')
print( '</body></html>')

What I do is:

1) Go to command line C:\Python (where python is installed)

2) run: python -m http.server

3) Got to Firefox and type http://localhost:8000/hello.py

However, instead of "Hello World", the browser just prints the content of the hello.py file.

How can I fix it?

your webserver isnt "running python". your python is running a webserver. — TehTris
– TehTris, Commented May 28, 2015 at 20:29
You should edit your original question instead of just reposting it. — kylieCatt
– kylieCatt, Commented May 28, 2015 at 20:29
@IanAuld, my other question was regarding configuring WAMP. This question is regarding http.server. No reposting - this is a different question — Yura
– Yura, Commented May 28, 2015 at 20:33
@Yura This tutorial will cover a lot of things but is pretty easy to follow along with. This one is much more basic (and slightly out dated) but will show you the basics. — kylieCatt
– kylieCatt, Commented May 28, 2015 at 21:04
By the way you do not type in 'localhost:8000/hello.py' do it WITHOUT 'hello.py' — Tom-Oliver Heidel
– Tom-Oliver Heidel, Commented May 28, 2015 at 21:55

jfs · Accepted Answer · 2018-05-18 05:57:51Z

34

From the http.server docs:

CGIHTTPRequestHandler can be enabled in the command line by passing the --cgi option:

$ python3 -m http.server --bind localhost --cgi 8000

Put your script into cgi_directories:

This defaults to ['/cgi-bin', '/htbin'] and describes directories to treat as containing CGI scripts.

Open in the browser:

$ python -mwebbrowser http://localhost:8000/cgi-bin/hello.py

where hello.py:

#!/usr/bin/env python3
print("Content-Type: text/html\n")
print("<!doctype html><title>Hello</title><h2>hello world</h2>")

I had to make it executable on POSIX: chmod +x cgi-bin/hello.py.

edited May 18, 2018 at 5:57

answered May 28, 2015 at 20:46

jfs

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14 Comments

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

can you test my python3 script if it really works. I do not want to install python3 right now or use some online python because those work some different.

jfs Over a year ago

@Tom-OliverHeidel: sure. What commands do you want me to run and what do you expect to happen (define "really works": do you care about multiple concurrent clients, security, buffers, etc)?

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

scroll down a bit - the other answer is mine.

jfs Over a year ago

@Yura: 1. have you put hello.py into cgi-bin directory? 2. Have you appended --cgi as shown above? 3. Have you visited localhost:8000/cgi-bin/hello.py (note: cgi-bin in url)? 4. Have your added additional "\r\n" after the http header?

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

@Yura is using windows so. J.F. Sebastian he will not have a cgi-bin by default. I guess he is just testing some python at all.

|

Bruno Bronosky · Accepted Answer · 2018-02-19 17:13:46Z

5

I created a complete example for a friend. It is a complete demo you can run with 8 simple copy-paste ready lines of code. Enjoy.

echo -e "\n\n    Usage: after running this script, visit http://localhost:8000/cgi-bin/hello    \n\n"
mkdir /tmp/cgi-bin/
cat > /tmp/cgi-bin/hello <<EOF
#!/bin/bash
echo -e "Content-Type: text/plain\n\n"; date; echo; env
EOF
chmod +x /tmp/cgi-bin/hello
(cd /tmp; python3 -m http.server --cgi 8000)

answered Feb 19, 2018 at 17:13

Bruno Bronosky

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1 Comment

Bruno Poultier Over a year ago

Thanks !!! You give me a very useful solution and I didn't spend lot of time

Chris Huang-Leaver · Accepted Answer · 2020-03-30 00:27:18Z

2

I did this some time ago for Python2.7

from BaseHTTPServer import BaseHTTPRequestHandler

class GetHandler(BaseHTTPRequestHandler):

    def do_HEAD(self):
        self.send_response(200)
        self.send_header("Content-type", "text/html")
        self.end_headers()

    def do_GET(self):
        x = self.wfile.write
        self.send_response(200)
        self.send_header("Content-type", "text/html")
        self.end_headers()
        # <--- HTML starts here --->
        x("<html>")
        # <--- HEAD starts here --->
        x("<head>")
        x("<title>Title goes here!</title>")
        x("</head>")
        # <--- HEAD ends here --->
        # <--- BODY starts here --->
        x("<body>")
        x("<p>This is a test.</p>")
        x("</body>")
        # <--- BODY ends here --->
        x("</html>")
        # <--- HTML ends here --->

if __name__ == '__main__':
    from BaseHTTPServer import HTTPServer
    server = HTTPServer(('localhost', 777), GetHandler)
    print 'Starting server, use <Ctrl + F2> to stop'
    server.serve_forever()

So in Python 3 you just need to change imports

from http.server import BaseHTTPRequestHandler

class GetHandler(BaseHTTPRequestHandler):

    def do_HEAD(self):
        self.send_response(200)
        self.send_header("Content-type", "text/html")
        self.end_headers()

    def do_GET(self):
        x = self.wfile.write
        self.send_response(200)
        self.send_header("Content-type", "text/html")
        self.end_headers()
        # <--- HTML starts here --->
        x("<html>")
        # <--- HEAD starts here --->
        x("<head>")
        x("<title>Title goes here!</title>")
        x("</head>")
        # <--- HEAD ends here --->
        # <--- BODY starts here --->
        x("<body>")
        x("<p>This is a test.</p>")
        x("</body>")
        # <--- BODY ends here --->
        x("</html>")
        # <--- HTML ends here --->

if __name__ == '__main__':
    from http.server import HTTPServer
    server = HTTPServer(('localhost', 777), GetHandler)
    print('Starting server, use <Ctrl + F2> to stop')
    server.serve_forever()

edited Mar 30, 2020 at 0:27

Chris Huang-Leaver

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answered May 28, 2015 at 20:41

Tom-Oliver Heidel

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9 Comments

Yura Over a year ago

Thanks @Tom-Oliver Heidel, Im a newbie, please guide me what to do with this code you have posted and where to place it to make my hello-world.py work oin the browser. Thanks

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

I cannot guarantuee 100% that the python3 code will work because I just used python docs in short time. But there is a tool called '2to3' which will convert python2 script into python3 script docs.python.org/2/glossary.html#term-to3 Actually you just need to copy the scripty and name it like e.g. 'httpserver.py' then you can use cmd and type in 'python httpserver.py' to start it.

jfs Over a year ago

I've changed 777 to 7777 (permission error on Unix) and replaced all str literals by bytes literals on Python 3. Ctrl + F2 does something unrelated on my Ubuntu machine. After that it shows: "This is a test." if you visit: localhost:7777.

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

@Yura when you got the file saved and executed with 'python filename.py' you can go and open your browser. type in 'localhost:777' or to whatever you changed the port in the script.

Tom-Oliver Heidel Over a year ago

I never said to type in 'localhost:777/hello.py' when you executing the python file you can read 'Starting server ........' then you type into your browser 'localhost:777' nothing more.

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