getting info from wep pages?

Can anyone explain the typical process used to get user defined data from a web page? I was thinking that an applet is normally used to extract data via the applets parameters which are populated with values from web pages controls.
Ive been programming stand alone java applications for awhile and i would like to start understanding the web side of Java. Thanks in advance :)

There's a method of Applet that retrieves a parameter. And you could use JSP or PHP or similar to write those params. So the user has a form, hits submit and gets sent to a page where PHP writes those values into params.
At it's simplest:

file1.htm:

Code:

---

...
<form method="get" action="file2.php">
<input type="text" name="box" />
<input type="submit" value="Hit me!" />
</form>
...

---

file2.php:

Code:

---

...
<applet code="MyApplet.class" width="200" height="100">
<param name="box" value="<?php echo $HTTP_GET_VARS[box]; ?>" />
</applet>
...

---

Of course this requires a web server where PHP can run.

You read my mind CornedBee. :) Now if i may pick your brain for a few. :D. In the line

Code:

---

<param name="box" value="<?php echo $HTTP_GET_VARS[box]; ?>" />

---

could the php code inside be written in pearl or some other code?

Yeah. I mean, you'd need other ways of actually writing the code of course, but you could write it in mod_perl, ASP, JSP, or generate the whole page via CGI.