Hi everyone, I have a question about true real-time web delivery.

Lets say that I want to build a web page that for instance shows me all of the people logged into a linux machine and I want this page to show me in real-time. So if I leave the web page up and a new user logs in, I will automatically see that user come up without refreshing the page. Basically I guess this means there must be a "live" link between the server and the client.

I would like this web app to be in real-time and use apache server. Now correct me if I am wrong.

1. PHP can only simulate real-time display, but really you must refresh the page with a timer in the background.

2. A Java applet can do this in true real-time.

So my question is first am I wrong on the above statements? And second is there any other opensource technology out there that will display data in true real-time.

thanks

Suggestion - look at Ajax.

And/or Ajax libraries like Dojo.