thanks.
1. So okay, I get the part about the duration of the http connection.
2. Now what about the max time that WP will allow my back-end process to take? Am I then right in understanding that this is driven entirely by whatever the settings are on my host’s server for the Max_Execution_time in either or both of php.ini and Apache’s .htaccess file? WP just passes these on, so to speak?