NAME

CGI::remote_addr - Enhanced version of CGI.pm's "remote_addr()"

SYNOPSIS

use CGI;
use CGI::remote_addr;

my $cgi  = CGI->new();
my $addr = $cgi->remote_addr();

DESCRIPTION

CGI::remote_addr implements an enhanced version of the remote_addr() method provided by CGI.pm, which attempts to return the original IP address that the connection originated from (which is not necessarily the IP address that we received the connection from).

Simply loading CGI::remote_addr causes it to over-ride the existing remote_addr() method. Do note, though, that this is a global over-ride; if you're running under mod_perl you've just over-ridden it for all of your applications.

Differences from CGI.pm

• We check not only $ENV{REMOTE_ADDR} to find the IP address, but also look in $ENV{HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR} to find the IP address. If $ENV{HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR} is defined, we try that first.
• Only valid IP addresses are returned, regardless of whatever exists in $ENV{REMOTE_ADDR} or $ENV{HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR}. I've seen lots of cases where the values for $ENV{HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR} were stuffed with garbage, and we make sure that you only get a real IP back.
• We return IPs in both a scalar and a list context. In scalar context you get the first (originating) IP address. In list context you get a unique list of all of the IPs that the connection was received through.
• In the event that we cannot find a valid IP address, this method returns undef, NOT 127.0.0.1 (like CGI.pm does).

METHODS

• remote_addr()

  Returns the IP address(es) of the remote host.

AUTHOR

Graham TerMarsch (cpan@howlingfrog.com)

COPYRIGHT

Copyright (C) 2008 Graham TerMarsch. All Rights Reserved.

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

SEE ALSO

• CGI