First, let me help you setting your solid ground, by letting you know what I started with.
I subscribed to a webhosting service which allows me a unix shell account. That means, I connect through a SSH client like "PuTTY" to my account, and start enjoying the power of UNIX. And through UNIX, I get perl for free. I will be taking you through unix track, however, you may want to take Windows track and benefit from the codes in this tutorial, but I might not be able to advice you on setup issues related to Windows.
To check that I have perl, I typed
perl -versionand got the following response.
[~]>perl -version This is perl, v5.8.8 built for x86_64-linux-thread-multi Copyright 1987-2006, Larry Wall Perl may be copied only under the terms of either the Artistic License or the GNU General Public License, which may be found in the Perl 5 source kit. Complete documentation for Perl, including FAQ lists, should be found on this system using "man perl" or "perldoc perl". If you have access to the Internet, point your browser at http://www.perl.org/, the Perl Home Page.
I downloaded a copy of the Qur'an from http://tanzil.info/download. They have multiple versions, for computational processing, it might be wise to use the 'simple clean' version with verse numbers included. Following are first few lines of this file, using Unix command 'head filename.
>head tanzil-verses.txt 1|1|بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم 1|2|الحمد لله رب العالمين 1|3|الرحمن الرحيم 1|4|مالك يوم الدين 1|5|إياك نعبد وإياك نستعين 1|6|اهدنا الصراط المستقيم 1|7|صراط الذين أنعمت عليهم غير المغضوب عليهم ولا الضالين 2|1| الم 2|2|ذلك الكتاب لا ريب فيه هدى للمتقين 2|3|الذين يؤمنون بالغيب ويقيمون الصلاة ومما رزقناهم ينفقون
So, this file has in each line three fields delimited by a bar '|':chapter number, then verse number, and finally the verse in text.
Now, for an English translation, I used a text file containing translation published by 'Saheeh International' with the same format. You can download a copy here. Here is the format of the file.
[data]>head saheeh.tab 1|1|In the name of Allah , the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful. 1|2|[All] praise is [due] to Allah , Lord of the worlds - 1|3|The Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful, 1|4|Sovereign of the Day of Recompense. 1|5|It is You we worship and You we ask for help. 1|6|Guide us to the straight path - 1|7|The path of those upon whom You have bestowed favor, not of those who have evoked [Your] anger or of those who are astray. 2|1|Alif, Lam, Meem. 2|2|This is the Book about which there is no doubt, a guidance for those conscious of Allah - 2|3|Who believe in the unseen, establish prayer, and spend out of what We have provided for them,
For CGI support, you need to make sure that your host allows this. So, now assuming that you have these two text files, Unix shell, perl and CGI support, then why wait, lets begin some fun!