You run Perl as a CGI (Common Gateway Interface) script at Loopia by placing the script in the cgi-bin directory of a (sub)domain on our Unix platform, giving it the .cgi file extension and 755 permissions, and pointing its shebang line at /usr/local/bin/perl.
We support Perl 5.42. Last checked: 2026-09-22.
Requirements for running a Perl CGI script
To run a CGI script at Loopia, the following is required:
- The (sub)domain must be on one of our Unix servers. If it isn’t, change the web platform to Unix first.
- The script must be located in the cgi-bin directory. If the directory doesn’t exist, create it as yourdomain.com/public_html/cgi-bin. To run the script from another directory, see “Another directory” below – otherwise the script will not run.
- The file extension must be .cgi for this to work.
- The file permissions must be 755 (CHMOD). You can set this with an FTP client.
- The path to Perl is /usr/local/bin/perl – this is the path to use in the script’s shebang line.
- The path to Sendmail is /usr/sbin/sendmail.
Another directory
If you don’t place the script in the cgi-bin folder, you need to change some Apache settings with an .htaccess file. Create a file called .htaccess in the public_html folder and add the following lines:
Options +ExecCGI AddHandler cgi-script .cgi
The same .htaccess mechanism is used for Python scripts – see How do you run Python scripts as CGI on Loopia’s UNIX web hosting?
Example script
Below is an example of what a script can look like to run on a website:
#!/usr/local/bin/perl print "Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8\n\n"; print "Hello and welcome to my test script.";
Save it as, for example, test.cgi in cgi-bin, set the permissions to 755 and open it in your browser.
Support scope for scripts
Our support does not cover script-related problems that are not caused by one of our servers or similar, and we are unable to assist you with your programming.
If you have a problem with a script and would like us to look at it, send the path to the script, a brief explanation of what you are trying to do and any error messages you receive to support@loopia.com.
Recommended links
The following external resources are useful for Perl and CGI (Common Gateway Interface) developers: