The CGI specification will be specific to the server in question, and the part of the URL that follows the CGI name is passed to the CGI upon invocation. This data may include a file name, but it may as easily be some arbitrary string of instructions. The DODS server is simply a set of CGI scripts executed on demand by the httpd server. If a CGI is not specified, the part of the URL after the host name is simply the name of a file that is to be returned to the inquiring browser. If a CGI is specified, the file is given to the program as its argument.
Different suffixes demand different services from the server.
The different services are listed in Section 2.2 . If you are using DODS from a DODS client, or a client program adapted to use the DODS DAP library, you do not need to use a URL suffix. For example, to use DODS from Matlab, with the Matlab GUI or command-line clients, you do not need to use a suffix. To use DODS from a simple web browser like Netscape Navigator, you will need to use a suffix. DODS URLs can get somewhat more complicated than this simple description.