Greetings:

I'm trying to find out if it's possible to use a php script to initiate a perl script on the server when php is only installed as an apache module on the server.

More specifically I need first to be able to create a file on the server remotely via http using php scripts and data from a mysql db.  This part my modest php skills can handle.

I then need to remotely initiate some API-based transactions involving that file on the server and a separate secure host via https and an LDAP based system.  That host has supplied the users of this system some sample API files in the form of perl and vb scripts but unfortunately aimed at Windows users.  I'm doing this preferably on a Mac (OS 10.4) or possibly a linux box.  I am essentially totally ignorant in perl but others have done this for their commercial products so it's do-able.  My novice reading of the perl scripts suggests I need to figure how to get php to pass some variables like filenames, userid and passwords on to the API.

My question is:  before I take on the challenge of figuring out this API stuff I want to be sure I'll be able to trigger it remotely.  Can the php module do this or is there to much security risk to the server?

Hopefully that's clear and thanks for your input.