HTTP

From DreamHost

Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is a method used to transfer or convey information on the World Wide Web. It is a patented open internet protocol whose original purpose was to provide a way to publish and receive HTML pages. HTTP is a request/response protocol between clients and servers. The originating client, such as a web browser, spider, or other end-user tool, is referred to as the user agent. The destination server, which stores or creates resources such as HTML files and images, is called the origin server.

Contents 1 HTTP Conversation 1.1 Client Request 1.2 Server Response 2 See Also 3 External Links

HTTP Conversation

Below is a sample of part of an HTTP conversation:

Client Request

GET /index.html HTTP/1.1
Host: www.example.com

Server Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2006 22:38:34 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.33 (Unix)  (Debian/Linux)
Last-Modified: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 23:11:55 GMT
Etag: "3f80f-1b6-3e1cb03b"
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Content-Length: 438
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8

See Also

• Last-Modified
• If-Modified-Since
• Conditional GET

External Links

• Hypertext Transfer Protocol specification (HTTP/1/1)