About AspHTTP
AspHTTP allows you to GET/POST/HEAD documents using the HTTP protocol.
Features include:
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GET, HEAD and POST request methods
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Response headers are exposed
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Accept headers are modifiable
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Adjustable timeout
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Proxy support
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Custom User-Agent headers
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Custom Content-Type headers for POST
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Redirection
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Supports authentication areas (Basic only, NOT NTLM)
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Retrieves URLs to a file including binary files
-
Allows custom HTTP request headers
Changes in AspHTTP 3.5
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Better support for MTS. Transactions are not supported in the 3.0 release but
you should be able
to incorporate AspHTTP into MTS packages without any problems. 3.5 also has
performance optimizations over 3.0.
AspHTTP Installation
To use this ASP component move the DLL into a subdirectory (like
\winnt\system32 for NT or \windows\system for Win95).
Change to the directory where you move the DLL before registering the
component.
To register the component on the system type:
regsvr32 asphttp.dll
Simple HTTP Example
Using the component is as simple as
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Creating the object
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Setting a single property
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Calling the GetURL method
The following code demonstrates how to use AspHTTP from VBScript.
Set HttpObj = Server.CreateObject("AspHTTP.Conn")
HTTPObj.Url = "http://www.myfinancialpage.com/qrtresults.html"
strResult = HTTPObj.GetURL
The variable named strResult now contains a string representing the document
results from a GET
of http://www.myfinancialpage.com/qrtresults.html.
POSTing Data
AspHTTP allows you to post data back to the Web server.
The following example demonstrates a POST request:
Set HttpObj = Server.CreateObject("AspHTTP.Conn")
HTTPObj.Url = "http://www.myfinancialpage.com/scripts/update3.asp"
HTTPObj.PostData = "suid=jimb pwd=macabre id=32 val=1.5"
HTTPObj.RequestMethod = "POST"
strResult = HTTPObj.GetURL
The variable named strResult now contains a string representing the document
results from a POST to
http://www.myfinancialpage.com/scripts/update3.asp.
About purchasing AspHTTP
-
Licensing is on a per server CPU basis. The product is available for purchase
from http://www.serverobjects.com/products.htm
About Upgrades
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Users can upgrade for free for minor version changes. For example, upgrades
from version 1.00 to 1.99 are free.
The upgrade from 1.99 to 2.0 may
carry an additional license fee.
-
The latest version of the components are always available at
http://www.serverobjects.com/products.htm.
If a fee is associated with obtaining the upgrade it will be noted on that
page.
Installing Upgrades
Stop all IIS related services such as Gopher, FTP and W3SVC. Uninstalling the
old DLL is not necessary.
If the DLL has been loaded you will get an error message saying the file is in
use by another process.
Stop that process and then copy the file. Restart the necessary services.
Frequently Asked Questions
| What are the common installation problems? |
See http://www.serverobjects.com/TechComm.htm
for a list of problems and solutions.
Download TShoot, our troubleshooting utility from
http://www.serverobjects.com/utils/tshoot.zip. |
| I call GetURL but nothing is returned. |
Check the Error and Response properties for possible failures or
response values that won't show up the the GetURL return value. |
| AspHTTP returns results that are different from what I get when I
use browser xyz. |
Set AspHTTP.UserAgent to the browser type you are testing against.
Many Web sites customize the resultant HTML based on the UserAgent value. |
| How do I get just a URL's headers, but not the content. |
HTTPObj.RequestMethod = "HEAD" |
| Does AspHTTP currently support SSL / https? |
Not yet. No eta is available for this feature.
|
| My proxy uses both a user name and password. How do I set that with
AspHTTP? |
Set the ProxyPassword property to the username and password
seperated by only a colon.
Example:
HTTPObj.ProxyPassword = "proxyusername:proxypassword"
|
Technical Support
If you require technical support please see our tech support page at
http://www.serverobjects.com/support.htm
AspHTTP Properties
| Accept |
The Accept property indicates what kind of MIME types
can be accepted by the requesting program.
Example:
HTTPObj.Accept = "*/*"
|
| Authorization |
The Authorization header allows you to retrieve URLs that are
located in authenticated areas.
To use the Authorization property set this property to the username and
password,
seperated by a colon ":", for the password protected area.
Example:
HTTPObj.Authorization = "jimb:superbmr"
|
| BinaryData |
Returns the data available from the GetURL request in binary form.
You can use this property to grab binary data such as images off another
server.
Example:
<%
Response.ContentType = "image/gif"
Set HTTPObj = Server.CreateObject("AspHTTP.Conn")
HTTPObj.Url = "http://www.microsoft.com/library/images/gifs/toolbar/write.gif"
HTTPObj.GetURL
Response.BinaryWrite HTTPObj.BinaryData
%>
|
| ContentType |
The ContentType property allows you to specify custom content-type
headers during a POST operation.
Example:
ContentType = "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
|
| Error |
Reports any errors that may occur during the request. |
| FollowRedirects |
FollowRedirects tells the component to follow redirect
responses from the HTTP server.
Example:
HTTPObj.FollowRedirects = true
|
| Headers |
The Headers property contains the response headers
from the HTTP request after the
request has been completed by a call to the GetURL method.
Example:
Response.Write HTTPObj.Headers
|
| HTTPLog |
Filename where HTTP transaction data can be logged.
Example:
HTTPObj.HTTPLog = "c:\httplog.txt"
|
| MaxRedirects |
Sets the maximum number of times an HTTP redirection
will be allowed. The default value is 3. (version >= 3.51). |
| Port |
The Port property indicates which port to contact the
HTTP server on.
Example:
HTTPObj.Port = 80
|
| PostData |
The PostData property should be set to the values of
the data that you want to post to the server for a post request.
Example:
HTTPObj.PostData = "suid=jimb&act=upd"
|
| Protocol |
The Protocol property indicates what version of HTTP
the request should be made using.
By default Protocol is HTTP/1.0
Example:
HTTPObj.Protocol = "HTTP/1.1"
|
| Proxy |
The proxy property contains the address and port of
the proxy server seperated by a colon.
Example:
HTTPObj.Proxy = "address.net:2001"
|
| ProxyPassword |
Sets the HTTP Proxy password for HTTP proxy servers
that require authentication.
Only basic authentication is currently supported. |
| RequestMethod |
The RequestMethod property indicates what type of HTTP
request should be made to the server.
Legal values are "GET", "POST" and "HEAD".
Example:
HTTPObj.RequestMethod = "POST"
|
| RegisteredUser |
The RegisteredUser property indicates the name the
component is licensed to.
Example:
Response.Write "This component is licensed to " HTTPObj.RegisteredUser
|
| Response |
The Response property contains the HTTP response after a request
has been received from
a Web server. |
| SaveFileTo |
The SaveFileTo allows you to retrieve files of any type and have
them automatically saved to
a local server disk.
This allows you to retrieve binary files such as images, as well as text files,
like HTML files.
To use the SaveFileTo property set the value of SaveFileTo to the name of the
local directory and file name where the requested URL should be saved.
Be sure the user has security rights that allow the writing of the file.
Set this property before the call to GetURL if you wish to save to a
file.
Example:
HTTPObj.SaveFileTo = "c:\images\3rdqrtr.jpg"
|
| TimeOut |
The timeout property determines how long the component
should wait for a response from the HTTP server. The default timeout is 60
seconds.
Example:
HTTPObj.TimeOut = 45
|
| URL |
The URL property should be set to the URL you wish the
request to operate upon.
URLs should be preceded with http://.
Example:
HTTPObj.URL = "http://www.myfinancial.com/scripts/update3.asp"
|
| UserAgent |
The UserAgent property allows the component to
impersonate browsers by sending
a UserAgent header in the request.
Example:
HTTPObj.UserAgent = "Mozilla Compatible (MS IE 3.01 WinNT)"
|
| Version |
The version property indicates the internal version of
the AspHTTP component.
Example:
Response.Write "The component version is " & HTTPObj.Version
|
AspHTTP Component Methods
| Method |
Parameters |
Return Value |
Description |
| GetURL |
None |
String |
GetURL returns the reponse of the HTTP request.
This value is a string value and the component currently does not support
binary return values such as GIF or JPEG images. |
| AddExtraHeader |
String |
None |
Adds a custom HTTP header to the request.
Custom headers may include simulated browser headers such as IE's display
resolution headers.
HTTPObj.AddExtraHeader ("Cookie: ASPSESSIONID=EKKDDPSDKCCPZRNA; path=/kb")
|
| ClearExtraHeaders |
None |
None |
Clears any HTTP request headers that were set using AddExtraHeader. |
| GetHeader |
String |
String |
Get's the value of a specific header after GetURL has been called.
If multiple headers have the same value GetHeader returns the first. To search
all headers see GetHeaders.
Example:
strCookie = HTTPObj.GetHeader("Set-Cookie")
You could then on subsequent calls return the same cookie as follows:
if strCookie <> "" then
HTTPObj.AddExtraHeader "Cookie: " & strCookie
end if
|
| GetHeaders |
None |
String |
Returns all Header values for manual parsing. Header values are CrLf separated. |
| GetHREFs |
None |
Variant array of Strings |
After a call to GetURL you can call GetHREFs to parse any
<a href=""> tags in the HTML. GetHREFs returns a variant array of strings
that you can further parse or display.
See HREFList.asp for example code that uses this method. GetHREFs was added in
version 2.4. |
| URLDecode |
strValue |
String |
Decodes an URL encoded string |
| URLEncode |
strValue |
String |
Encodes an string to a legal URL value.
Example:
HTTPObj.URL = "http://www.test_xyz.com?"
& HTTPObj.URLEncode("avalue=this is a value with spaces")
|
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