[Novalug] WebDAV? SOAP? "Something else?"

[Kevin Cole]

Hi,

Background:

I've written a Python / PostgreSQL beastie that takes 4060-byte
fixed-length records, massages them and produces three PDF reports and
prints them, and optionally creates a CSV, and on rare occasions,
stores data in the psql database.  CD's arrive periodically with the
data files.  There's also a bash script around it to sort the records
and offer the user the possibility of editing the data.

The data is confidential, and the reports are currently only run by
one person -- unless she gets something oddball, in which case I run
the reports.  However, the situation could change to a point where the
folks who get these reports could end up running the reports for
themselves.

The Question:

Recently, we had several disasters befall our little office, one of
which being a lightning strike that blew up the computer that runs the
reports. While the software is all backed up, I had to go hunting for
a new computer. Now I'm thinking: Is there a reasonably
straightforward way to put all this out on a secure web server with an
unadvertised address, and just have folks upload the input file, click
"Submit", and get back links to the generated PDF's and CSV?  Having
the end-user manually print the PDF's is fine, as the end clients
often want more than one copy anyway, and the person who runs my code
is used to manually printing the reports.

Since I've not done that sort of thing before, I'm running into terms
that I've seen and ignored before, like WebDAV, SOAP, etc. which make
my head spin.

Any recommendations for a remote way to do what is essentially a
(mostly) non-interactive batch job?  I'd like it to just piggyback off
of an existing apache-based web server. If I have to set up a separate
machine, and get a new host name, etc, I may as well just go back to
the old way, and set up a dedicated computer in-house, running the
software while physically sitting at the computer.  (I'm not in the IT
department, and would have to go through our HelpDesk system to get
the IP / DNS / Firewall stuff set up right.  Too much like work.)

Thanks.

-- 
Ubuntu Linux DC LoCo
Washington, DC
http://dc.ubuntu-us.org/