Sam Hartman
Charles Lowell
Zane Rockenbaugh
MIC, or Mesa Interface Compiler, is a tool meant to simplify Web interface design. MIC allows the embedding of Perl code and special MIC tags into an otherwise normal HTML document. The MIC code is then (com)piled by MIC to produce what is known as a pile (a partial CGI script) which is run via a pile driver.1
One central idea of MIC is to take the awkward HTML out of CGI and put the power of CGI into HTML. This is accomplished by providing HTML-like tags, which controls page look and data presentation, and the full functionality of CGI scripting in a simpler, more familiar environment. MIC can be thought of as a tool for creating dynamic HTML pages. In fact, MIC pages (i.e., HTML pages with MIC code) can be viewed directly in a standard HTML browser and will produce sensible, though probably not very pretty, results.
There are many other advantages that MIC has over standard CGI scripting, such as automation of security, field propagation and other features that are built into MIC.