Hi!
I'm totally new to web programming but - well, here's the situation:
We are buying some complex bit of software which is still very much in development.
So far it looks as if those guys really intend to do their own application server
between a database (oracle) and a number of clients.

Now, those clients all open sessions to the database (that is, the appserver does)
and execute requests which the appserver translates into database dependent sql.

We can give a bit of input to those people and I'd very much like to suggest that
they use apache as the application server because it saves us administration
costs, them development costs and both of us a lot of frust with their homegrown
"version 1" appserver.

But I do not know enough to make such a suggestion in good faith, and that's why
there is this posting.

So, is the above scenario (paragraphs one and two) possible at all with apache?
How far can one fit in apache into the middle of a three tier architecture
where html or web browsers don't come into the picture at all? Can client
connect to apache /only/ using http or are other ways like rpc possible too?
What about XML-RPC?

How are the database connections mapped to client sessions with login and
logout and transaction commits/rollbacks and timeouts?

How is apaches oracle support? In particular, does automatic failover to
a standby database work? (oracle speak: transparent failover)

Lots of Greetings!
Volker
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