httpie-cli/README.rst

****************************************
HTTPie: a CLI, cURL-like tool for humans
****************************************


HTTPie (pronounced *aych-tee-tee-pie*) is a **command line HTTP client**.  Its
goal is to make CLI interaction with web services as **human-friendly** as
possible. It provides a simple ``http`` command that allows for sending
arbitrary HTTP requests using a simple and natural syntax, and displays
colorized responses. HTTPie can be used for **testing, debugging**, and
generally **interacting** with HTTP servers.


.. image:: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/raw/master/httpie.png
    :alt: HTTPie compared to cURL
    :width: 835
    :height: 835
    :align: center


------


.. image:: https://raw.github.com/claudiatd/httpie-artwork/master/images/httpie_logo_simple.png
    :alt: HTTPie logo
    :align: center

HTTPie is written in Python, and under the hood it uses the excellent
`Requests`_ and `Pygments`_ libraries.


**Table of Contents**


.. contents::
    :local:
    :depth: 1
    :backlinks: none


=============
Main Features
=============

* Expressive and intuitive syntax
* Formatted and colorized terminal output
* Built-in JSON support
* Forms and file uploads
* HTTPS, proxies, and authentication
* Arbitrary request data
* Custom headers
* Persistent sessions
* Wget-like downloads
* Python 2.6, 2.7 and 3.x support
* Linux, Mac OS X and Windows support
* Plugins
* Documentation
* Test coverage


============
Installation
============



------------------------
Stable version |version|
------------------------

On **Mac OS X**, HTTPie can be installed via `Homebrew <http://brew.sh/>`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ brew install httpie


Most **Linux** distributions provide a package that can be installed via
system package manager, e.g. ``yum install httpie`` or ``apt-get install httpie``.
Note that the package might include a slightly older version of HTTPie.


A **universal installation method** (that works on **Windows**, Mac OS X, Linux, …,
and provides the latest version) is to use `pip`_:


.. code-block:: bash

    $ pip install --upgrade httpie


If the above fails, please use ``easy_install`` instead (``$ easy_install httpie``).




-------------------
Development version
-------------------

===========  =============  =============
Tests        Mac/Linux      Windows
|coverage|   |unix|         |windows|
===========  =============  =============


The **latest development version** can be installed directly from GitHub:

.. code-block:: bash

    # Mac OS X via Homebrew
    $ brew install httpie --HEAD

    # Universal
    $ pip install --upgrade https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/tarball/master



=====
Usage
=====


Hello World:


.. code-block:: bash

    $ http httpie.org


Synopsis:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http [flags] [METHOD] URL [ITEM [ITEM]]


See also ``http --help``.


--------
Examples
--------

Custom `HTTP method`_, `HTTP headers`_ and `JSON`_ data:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http PUT example.org X-API-Token:123 name=John


Submitting `forms`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -f POST example.org hello=World


See the request that is being sent using one of the `output options`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -v example.org


Use `Github API`_ to post a comment on an
`issue <https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/issues/83>`_
with `authentication`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -a USERNAME POST https://api.github.com/repos/jakubroztocil/httpie/issues/83/comments body='HTTPie is awesome!'


Upload a file using `redirected input`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http example.org < file.json


Download a file and save it via `redirected output`_:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http example.org/file > file


Download a file ``wget`` style:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --download example.org/file

Use named `sessions`_ to make certain aspects or the communication persistent
between requests to the same host:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --session=logged-in -a username:password httpbin.org/get API-Key:123

    $ http --session=logged-in httpbin.org/headers


Set a custom ``Host`` header to work around missing DNS records:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http localhost:8000 Host:example.com

..

--------

*What follows is a detailed documentation. It covers the command syntax,
advanced usage, and also features additional examples.*


===========
HTTP Method
===========

The name of the HTTP method comes right before the URL argument:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http DELETE example.org/todos/7


Which looks similar to the actual ``Request-Line`` that is sent:

.. code-block:: http

    DELETE /todos/7 HTTP/1.1


When the ``METHOD`` argument is **omitted** from the command, HTTPie defaults to
either ``GET`` (with no request data) or ``POST`` (with request data).


===========
Request URL
===========

The only information HTTPie needs to perform a request is a URL.
The default scheme is, somewhat unsurprisingly, ``http://``,
and can be omitted from the argument – ``http example.org`` works just fine.

Additionally, curl-like shorthand for localhost is supported.
This means that, for example ``:3000`` would expand to ``http://localhost:3000``
If the port is omitted, then port 80 is assumed.

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http :/foo


.. code-block:: http

    GET /foo HTTP/1.1
    Host: localhost


.. code-block:: bash

    $ http :3000/bar


.. code-block:: http

    GET /bar HTTP/1.1
    Host: localhost:3000


.. code-block:: bash

    $ http :


.. code-block:: http

    GET / HTTP/1.1
    Host: localhost

If find yourself manually constructing URLs with **querystring parameters**
on the terminal, you may appreciate the ``param==value`` syntax for appending
URL parameters so that you don't have to worry about escaping the ``&``
separators. To search for ``HTTPie`` on Google Images you could use this
command:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http GET www.google.com search==HTTPie tbm==isch


.. code-block:: http

    GET /?search=HTTPie&tbm=isch HTTP/1.1


=============
Request Items
=============

There are a few different *request item* types that provide a
convenient mechanism for specifying HTTP headers, simple JSON and
form data, files, and URL parameters.

They are key/value pairs specified after the URL. All have in
common that they become part of the actual request that is sent and that
their type is distinguished only by the separator used:
``:``, ``=``, ``:=``, ``==``, ``@``, ``=@``, and ``:=@``. The ones with an
``@`` expect a file path as value.

+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Item Type             | Description                                         |
+=======================+=====================================================+
| HTTP Headers          | Arbitrary HTTP header, e.g. ``X-API-Token:123``.    |
| ``Name:Value``        |                                                     |
+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| URL parameters        | Appends the given name/value pair as a query        |
| ``name==value``       | string parameter to the URL.                        |
|                       | The ``==`` separator is used                        |
+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Data Fields           | Request data fields to be serialized as a JSON      |
| ``field=value``,      | object (default), or to be form-encoded             |
| ``field=@file.txt``   | (``--form, -f``).                                   |
+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Raw JSON fields       | Useful when sending JSON and one or                 |
| ``field:=json``,      | more fields need to be a ``Boolean``, ``Number``,   |
| ``field:=@file.json`` | nested ``Object``, or an ``Array``,  e.g.,          |
|                       | ``meals:='["ham","spam"]'`` or ``pies:=[1,2,3]``    |
|                       | (note the quotes).                                  |
+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Form File Fields      | Only available with ``--form, -f``.                 |
| ``field@/dir/file``   | For example ``screenshot@~/Pictures/img.png``.      |
|                       | The presence of a file field results                |
|                       | in a ``multipart/form-data`` request.               |
+-----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+

You can use ``\`` to escape characters that shouldn't be used as separators
(or parts thereof). For instance, ``foo\==bar`` will become a data key/value
pair (``foo=`` and ``bar``) instead of a URL parameter.

You can also quote values, e.g. ``foo="bar baz"``.

Note that data fields aren't the only way to specify request data:
`Redirected input`_ allows for passing arbitrary data to be sent with the
request.


====
JSON
====

JSON is the *lingua franca* of modern web services and it is also the
**implicit content type** HTTPie by default uses:

If your command includes some data items, they are serialized as a JSON
object by default. HTTPie also automatically sets the following headers,
both of which can be overwritten:

================    =======================================
``Content-Type``    ``application/json; charset=utf-8``
``Accept``          ``application/json``
================    =======================================

You can use ``--json, -j`` to explicitly set ``Accept``
to ``application/json`` regardless of whether you are sending data
(it's a shortcut for setting the header via the usual header notation –
``http url Accept:application/json``).

Simple example:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http PUT example.org name=John email=john@example.org

.. code-block:: http

    PUT / HTTP/1.1
    Accept: application/json
    Accept-Encoding: identity, deflate, compress, gzip
    Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
    Host: example.org

    {
        "name": "John",
        "email": "john@example.org"
    }


Non-string fields use the ``:=`` separator, which allows you to embed raw JSON
into the resulting object. Text and raw JSON files can also be embedded into
fields using ``=@`` and ``:=@``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http PUT api.example.com/person/1 \
        name=John \
        age:=29 married:=false hobbies:='["http", "pies"]' \  # Raw JSON
        description=@about-john.txt \   # Embed text file
        bookmarks:=@bookmarks.json      # Embed JSON file


.. code-block:: http

    PUT /person/1 HTTP/1.1
    Accept: application/json
    Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
    Host: api.example.com

    {
        "age": 29,
        "hobbies": [
            "http",
            "pies"
        ],
        "description": "John is a nice guy who likes pies.",
        "married": false,
        "name": "John",
        "bookmarks": {
            "HTTPie": "http://httpie.org",
        }
    }


Send JSON data stored in a file (see `redirected input`_ for more examples):

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http POST api.example.com/person/1 < person.json


=====
Forms
=====

Submitting forms is very similar to sending `JSON`_ requests. Often the only
difference is in adding the ``--form, -f`` option, which ensures that
data fields are serialized as, and ``Content-Type`` is set to,
``application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=utf-8``.

It is possible to make form data the implicit content type instead of JSON
via the `config`_ file.


-------------
Regular Forms
-------------

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --form POST api.example.org/person/1 name='John Smith' email=john@example.org cv=@~/Documents/cv.txt


.. code-block:: http

    POST /person/1 HTTP/1.1
    Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=utf-8

    name=John+Smith&email=john%40example.org&cv=John's+CV+...


-----------------
File Upload Forms
-----------------

If one or more file fields is present, the serialization and content type is
``multipart/form-data``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -f POST example.com/jobs name='John Smith' cv@~/Documents/cv.pdf


The request above is the same as if the following HTML form were
submitted:

.. code-block:: html

    <form enctype="multipart/form-data" method="post" action="http://example.com/jobs">
        <input type="text" name="name" />
        <input type="file" name="cv" />
    </form>

Note that ``@`` is used to simulate a file upload form field, whereas
``=@`` just embeds the file content as a regular text field value.


============
HTTP Headers
============

To set custom headers you can use the ``Header:Value`` notation:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http example.org  User-Agent:Bacon/1.0  'Cookie:valued-visitor=yes;foo=bar'  X-Foo:Bar  Referer:http://httpie.org/


.. code-block:: http

    GET / HTTP/1.1
    Accept: */*
    Accept-Encoding: identity, deflate, compress, gzip
    Cookie: valued-visitor=yes;foo=bar
    Host: example.org
    Referer: http://httpie.org/
    User-Agent: Bacon/1.0
    X-Foo: Bar


There are a couple of default headers that HTTPie sets:

.. code-block:: http

    GET / HTTP/1.1
    Accept: */*
    Accept-Encoding: identity, deflate, compress, gzip
    User-Agent: HTTPie/<version>
    Host: <taken-from-URL>


Any of the default headers can be overwritten.


==============
Authentication
==============

The currently supported authentication schemes are Basic and Digest
(see `auth plugins`_ for more). There are two flags that control authentication:

===================     ======================================================
``--auth, -a``          Pass a ``username:password`` pair as
                        the argument. Or, if you only specify a username
                        (``-a username``), you'll be prompted for
                        the password before the request is sent.
                        To send a an empty password, pass ``username:``.
                        The ``username:password@hostname`` URL syntax is
                        supported as well (but credentials passed via ``-a``
                        have higher priority).

``--auth-type``         Specify the auth mechanism. Possible values are
                        ``basic`` and ``digest``. The default value is
                        ``basic`` so it can often be omitted.
===================     ======================================================



Basic auth:


.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -a username:password example.org


Digest auth:


.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --auth-type=digest -a username:password example.org


With password prompt:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -a username example.org


Authorization information from your ``~/.netrc`` file is honored as well:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ cat ~/.netrc
    machine httpbin.org
    login httpie
    password test

    $ http httpbin.org/basic-auth/httpie/test
    HTTP/1.1 200 OK
    [...]


------------
Auth Plugins
------------

* `httpie-oauth <https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie-oauth>`_: OAuth
* `httpie-ntlm <https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie-ntlm>`_: NTLM (NT LAN Manager)
* `httpie-negotiate <https://github.com/ndzou/httpie-negotiate>`_: SPNEGO (GSS Negotiate)
* `requests-hawk <https://github.com/mozilla-services/requests-hawk>`_: Hawk
* `httpie-api-auth <https://github.com/pd/httpie-api-auth>`_: ApiAuth


=======
Proxies
=======

You can specify proxies to be used through the ``--proxy`` argument for each
protocol (which is included in the value in case of redirects across protocols):

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --proxy=http:http://10.10.1.10:3128 --proxy=https:https://10.10.1.10:1080 example.org


With Basic authentication:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --proxy=http:http://user:pass@10.10.1.10:3128 example.org

You can also configure proxies by environment variables ``HTTP_PROXY`` and
``HTTPS_PROXY``, and the underlying Requests library will pick them up as well.
If you want to disable proxies configured through the environment variables for
certain hosts, you can specify them in ``NO_PROXY``.

In your ``~/.bash_profile``:

.. code-block:: bash

 export HTTP_PROXY=http://10.10.1.10:3128
 export HTTPS_PROXY=https://10.10.1.10:1080
 export NO_PROXY=localhost,example.com


=====
HTTPS
=====

-----------------------------------
Server SSL certificate verification
-----------------------------------

To skip the **host's SSL certificate verification,** you can pass
``--verify=no`` (default is ``yes``):

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --verify=no https://example.org


You can also use ``--verify=<CA_BUNDLE_PATH>`` to set a **custom CA bundle**
path:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --verify=/ssl/custom_ca_bundle https://example.org


The path can also be configured via the environment variable
``REQUESTS_CA_BUNDLE`` (picked up by the underlying python-requests library):

.. code-block:: bash

    $ REQUESTS_CA_BUNDLE=/ssl/custom_ca_bundle http https://example.org


---------------------------
Client side SSL certificate
---------------------------
To use a **client side certificate** for the SSL communication, you can pass
the path of the cert file with ``--cert``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --cert=client.pem https://example.org


If the **private key** is not contained in the cert file you may pass the
path of the key file with ``--cert-key``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --cert=client.crt --cert-key=client.key https://example.org


----------------------------
SNI (Server Name Indication)
----------------------------

If you use HTTPie with Python < 2.7.9
(can be verified with ``python --version``) and need to talk to servers that
use **SNI (Server Name Indication)** you need to install some additional
dependencies:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ pip install --upgrade pyopenssl pyasn1 ndg-httpsclient


You can use the following command to test SNI support:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http https://sni.velox.ch


==============
Output Options
==============

By default, HTTPie outputs the whole response message (headers as well as the
body).

You can control what should be printed via several options:

=================   =====================================================
``--headers, -h``   Only the response headers are printed.
``--body, -b``      Only the response body is printed.
``--verbose, -v``   Print the whole HTTP exchange (request and response).
``--print, -p``     Selects parts of the HTTP exchange.
=================   =====================================================

``--verbose`` can often be useful for debugging the request and generating
documentation examples:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --verbose PUT httpbin.org/put hello=world
    PUT /put HTTP/1.1
    Accept: application/json
    Accept-Encoding: identity, deflate, compress, gzip
    Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
    Host: httpbin.org
    User-Agent: HTTPie/0.2.7dev

    {
        "hello": "world"
    }


    HTTP/1.1 200 OK
    Connection: keep-alive
    Content-Length: 477
    Content-Type: application/json
    Date: Sun, 05 Aug 2012 00:25:23 GMT
    Server: gunicorn/0.13.4

    {
        […]
    }


All the other options are just a shortcut for ``--print, -p``.
It accepts a string of characters each of which represents a specific part of
the HTTP exchange:

==========  ==================
Character   Stands for
==========  ==================
``H``       Request headers.
``B``       Request body.
``h``       Response headers.
``b``       Response body.
==========  ==================

Print request and response headers:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --print=Hh PUT httpbin.org/put hello=world


-------------------------
Conditional Body Download
-------------------------

As an optimization, the response body is downloaded from the server
only if it's part of the output. This is similar to performing a ``HEAD``
request, except that it applies to any HTTP method you use.

Let's say that there is an API that returns the whole resource when it is
updated, but you are only interested in the response headers to see the
status code after an update:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --headers PATCH example.org/Really-Huge-Resource name='New Name'


Since we are only printing the HTTP headers here, the connection to the server
is closed as soon as all the response headers have been received.
Therefore, bandwidth and time isn't wasted downloading the body
which you don't care about.

The response headers are downloaded always, even if they are not part of
the output


================
Redirected Input
================

**A universal method for passing request data is through redirected** ``stdin``
(standard input). Such data is buffered and then with no further processing
used as the request body. There are multiple useful ways to use piping:

Redirect from a file:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http PUT example.com/person/1 X-API-Token:123 < person.json


Or the output of another program:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ grep '401 Unauthorized' /var/log/httpd/error_log | http POST example.org/intruders


You can use ``echo`` for simple data:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ echo '{"name": "John"}' | http PATCH example.com/person/1 X-API-Token:123


You can even pipe web services together using HTTPie:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http GET https://api.github.com/repos/jakubroztocil/httpie | http POST httpbin.org/post


You can use ``cat`` to enter multiline data on the terminal:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ cat | http POST example.com
    <paste>
    ^D


.. code-block:: bash

    $ cat | http POST example.com/todos Content-Type:text/plain
    - buy milk
    - call parents
    ^D


On OS X, you can send the contents of the clipboard with ``pbpaste``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ pbpaste | http PUT example.com


Passing data through ``stdin`` cannot be combined with data fields specified
on the command line:


.. code-block:: bash

    $ echo 'data' | http POST example.org more=data   # This is invalid


To prevent HTTPie from reading ``stdin`` data you can use the
``--ignore-stdin`` option.


-------------------------
Body Data From a Filename
-------------------------

**An alternative to redirected** ``stdin`` is specifying a filename (as
``@/path/to/file``) whose content is used as if it came from ``stdin``.

It has the advantage that **the** ``Content-Type``
**header is automatically set** to the appropriate value based on the
filename extension. For example, the following request sends the
verbatim contents of that XML file with ``Content-Type: application/xml``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http PUT httpbin.org/put @/data/file.xml


===============
Terminal Output
===============

HTTPie does several things by default in order to make its terminal output
easy to read.


---------------------
Colors and Formatting
---------------------

Syntax highlighting is applied to HTTP headers and bodies (where it makes
sense). You can choose your prefered color scheme via the ``--style`` option
if you don't like the default one (see ``$ http --help`` for the possible
values).

Also, the following formatting is applied:

* HTTP headers are sorted by name.
* JSON data is indented, sorted by keys, and unicode escapes are converted
  to the characters they represent.
* XML data is indented for better readability.

One of these options can be used to control output processing:

====================   ========================================================
``--pretty=all``       Apply both colors and formatting.
                       Default for terminal output.
``--pretty=colors``    Apply colors.
``--pretty=format``    Apply formatting.
``--pretty=none``      Disables output processing.
                       Default for redirected output.
====================   ========================================================

-----------
Binary data
-----------

Binary data is suppressed for terminal output, which makes it safe to perform
requests to URLs that send back binary data. Binary data is suppressed also in
redirected, but prettified output. The connection is closed as soon as we know
that the response body is binary,

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http example.org/Movie.mov


You will nearly instantly see something like this:

.. code-block:: http

    HTTP/1.1 200 OK
    Accept-Ranges: bytes
    Content-Encoding: gzip
    Content-Type: video/quicktime
    Transfer-Encoding: chunked

    +-----------------------------------------+
    | NOTE: binary data not shown in terminal |
    +-----------------------------------------+


=================
Redirected Output
=================

HTTPie uses **different defaults** for redirected output than for
`terminal output`_:

* Formatting and colors aren't applied (unless ``--pretty`` is specified).
* Only the response body is printed (unless one of the `output options`_ is set).
* Also, binary data isn't suppressed.

The reason is to make piping HTTPie's output to another programs and
downloading files work with no extra flags. Most of the time, only the raw
response body is of an interest when the output is redirected.

Download a file:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http example.org/Movie.mov > Movie.mov


Download an image of Octocat, resize it using ImageMagick, upload it elsewhere:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http octodex.github.com/images/original.jpg | convert - -resize 25% -  | http example.org/Octocats


Force colorizing and formatting, and show both the request and the response in
``less`` pager:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --pretty=all --verbose example.org | less -R


The ``-R`` flag tells ``less`` to interpret color escape sequences included
HTTPie`s output.

You can create a shortcut for invoking HTTPie with colorized and paged output
by adding the following to your ``~/.bash_profile``:

.. code-block:: bash

    function httpless {
        # `httpless example.org'
        http --pretty=all --print=hb "$@" | less -R;
    }


=============
Download Mode
=============

HTTPie features a download mode in which it acts similarly to ``wget``.

When enabled using the ``--download, -d`` flag, response headers are printed to
the terminal (``stderr``), and a progress bar is shown while the response body
is being saved to a file.

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --download https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/tarball/master

.. code-block:: http

    HTTP/1.1 200 OK
    Connection: keep-alive
    Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=jakubroztocil-httpie-0.4.1-33-gfc4f70a.tar.gz
    Content-Length: 505530
    Content-Type: application/x-gzip
    Server: GitHub.com
    Vary: Accept-Encoding

    Downloading 494.89 kB to "jakubroztocil-httpie-0.4.1-33-gfc4f70a.tar.gz"
    /  21.01% 104.00 kB   47.55 kB/s  0:00:08 ETA


If not provided via ``--output, -o``, the output filename will be determined
from ``Content-Disposition`` (if available), or from the URL and
``Content-Type``. If the guessed filename already exists, HTTPie adds a unique
suffix to it.

You can also redirect the response body to another program while the response
headers and progress are still shown in the terminal:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -d https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/tarball/master |  tar zxf -


If ``--output, -o`` is specified, you can resume a partial download using the
``--continue, -c`` option. This only works with servers that support
``Range`` requests and ``206 Partial Content`` responses. If the server doesn't
support that, the whole file will simply be downloaded:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -dco file.zip example.org/file

Other notes:

* The ``--download`` option only changes how the response body is treated.
* You can still set custom headers, use sessions, ``--verbose, -v``, etc.
* ``--download`` always implies ``--follow`` (redirects are followed).
* HTTPie exits with status code ``1`` (error) if the body hasn't been fully
  downloaded.
* ``Accept-Encoding`` cannot be set with ``--download``.


==================
Streamed Responses
==================

Responses are downloaded and printed in chunks, which allows for streaming
and large file downloads without using too much RAM. However, when
`colors and formatting`_ is applied, the whole response is buffered and only
then processed at once.


You can use the ``--stream, -S`` flag to make two things happen:

1. The output is flushed in **much smaller chunks** without any buffering,
   which makes HTTPie behave kind of like ``tail -f`` for URLs.

2. Streaming becomes enabled even when the output is prettified: It will be
   applied to **each line** of the response and flushed immediately. This makes
   it possible to have a nice output for long-lived requests, such as one
   to the Twitter streaming API.


Prettified streamed response:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --stream -f -a YOUR-TWITTER-NAME https://stream.twitter.com/1/statuses/filter.json track='Justin Bieber'


Streamed output by small chunks alá ``tail -f``:

.. code-block:: bash

    # Send each new tweet (JSON object) mentioning "Apple" to another
    # server as soon as it arrives from the Twitter streaming API:
    $ http --stream -f -a YOUR-TWITTER-NAME https://stream.twitter.com/1/statuses/filter.json track=Apple \
    | while read tweet; do echo "$tweet" | http POST example.org/tweets ; done

========
Sessions
========

By default, every request is completely independent of any previous ones.
HTTPie also supports persistent sessions, where custom headers (except for the
ones starting with ``Content-`` or ``If-``), authorization, and cookies
(manually specified or sent by the server) persist between requests
to the same host.

--------------
Named Sessions
--------------

Create a new session named ``user1`` for ``example.org``:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --session=user1 -a user1:password example.org X-Foo:Bar

Now you can refer to the session by its name, and the previously used
authorization and HTTP headers will automatically be set:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --session=user1 example.org

To create or reuse a different session, simple specify a different name:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --session=user2 -a user2:password example.org X-Bar:Foo

To use a session without updating it from the request/response exchange
once it is created, specify the session name via
``--session-read-only=SESSION_NAME`` instead.

Named sessions' data is stored in JSON files in the directory
``~/.httpie/sessions/<host>/<name>.json``
(``%APPDATA%\httpie\sessions\<host>\<name>.json`` on Windows).

------------------
Anonymous Sessions
------------------

Instead of a name, you can also directly specify a path to a session file. This
allows for sessions to be re-used across multiple hosts:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http --session=/tmp/session.json example.org
    $ http --session=/tmp/session.json admin.example.org
    $ http --session=~/.httpie/sessions/another.example.org/test.json example.org
    $ http --session-read-only=/tmp/session.json example.org


**Warning:** All session data, including credentials, cookie data,
and custom headers are stored in plain text.

Note that session files can also be created and edited manually in a text
editor; they are plain JSON.

See also `Config`_.


======
Config
======

HTTPie uses a simple configuration file that contains a JSON object with the
following keys:

=========================     =================================================
``__meta__``                  HTTPie automatically stores some metadata here.
                              Do not change.

``implicit_content_type``     A ``String`` specifying the implicit content type
                              for request data. The default value for this
                              option is ``json`` and can be changed to
                              ``form``.

``default_options``           An ``Array`` (by default empty) of options
                              that should be applied to every request.

                              For instance, you can use this option to change
                              the default style and output options:
                              ``"default_options": ["--style=fruity", "--body"]``

                              Another useful default option is
                              ``"--session=default"`` to make HTTPie always
                              use `sessions`_.

                              Default options from config file can be unset
                              for a particular invocation via
                              ``--no-OPTION`` arguments passed on the
                              command line (e.g., ``--no-style``
                              or ``--no-session``).
=========================     =================================================

The default location of the configuration file is ``~/.httpie/config.json``
(or ``%APPDATA%\httpie\config.json`` on Windows).

The config directory location can be changed by setting the
``HTTPIE_CONFIG_DIR`` environment variable.


=========
Scripting
=========

When using HTTPie from **shell scripts**, it can be handy to set the
``--check-status`` flag. It instructs HTTPie to exit with an error if the
HTTP status is one of ``3xx``, ``4xx``, or ``5xx``. The exit status will
be ``3`` (unless ``--follow`` is set), ``4``, or ``5``,
respectively.

The ``--ignore-stdin`` option prevents HTTPie from reading data from ``stdin``,
which is usually not desirable during non-interactive invocations.

Also, the ``--timeout`` option allows to overwrite the default 30s timeout:

.. code-block:: bash

    #!/bin/bash

    if http --check-status --ignore-stdin --timeout=2.5 HEAD example.org/health &> /dev/null; then
        echo 'OK!'
    else
        case $? in
            2) echo 'Request timed out!' ;;
            3) echo 'Unexpected HTTP 3xx Redirection!' ;;
            4) echo 'HTTP 4xx Client Error!' ;;
            5) echo 'HTTP 5xx Server Error!' ;;
            *) echo 'Other Error!' ;;
        esac
    fi


================
Interface Design
================

The syntax of the command arguments closely corresponds to the actual HTTP
requests sent over the wire. It has the advantage  that it's easy to remember
and read. It is often possible to translate an HTTP request to an HTTPie
argument list just by inlining the request elements. For example, compare this
HTTP request:

.. code-block:: http

    POST /collection HTTP/1.1
    X-API-Key: 123
    User-Agent: Bacon/1.0
    Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded

    name=value&name2=value2


with the HTTPie command that sends it:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ http -f POST example.org/collection \
      X-API-Key:123 \
      User-Agent:Bacon/1.0 \
      name=value \
      name2=value2


Notice that both the order of elements and the syntax is very similar,
and that only a small portion of the command is used to control HTTPie and
doesn't directly correspond to any part of the request (here it's only ``-f``
asking HTTPie to send a form request).

The two modes, ``--pretty=all`` (default for terminal) and ``--pretty=none``
(default for redirected output), allow for both user-friendly interactive use
and usage from scripts, where HTTPie serves as a generic HTTP client.

As HTTPie is still under heavy development, the existing command line
syntax and some of the ``--OPTIONS`` may change slightly before
HTTPie reaches its final version ``1.0``. All changes are recorded in the
`changelog`_.


==========
Contribute
==========

Please see `CONTRIBUTING`_.


====
Logo
====

Please see `claudiatd/httpie-artwork`_

=======
Authors
=======

`Jakub Roztocil`_  (`@jakubroztocil`_) created HTTPie and `these fine people`_
have contributed.

=======
Licence
=======

Please see `LICENSE`_.


=========
Changelog
=========

*You can click a version name to see a diff with the previous one.*

* `1.0.0-dev`_
* `0.9.1`_ (2015-02-07)
    * Added support for Requests transport adapter plugins
      to enable plugin-provided features such as
      `unix socket <https://github.com/msabramo/httpie-unixsocket>`_
      communication and
      `HTTP/2 <https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie-http2>`_.
* `0.9.0`_ (2015-01-31)
    * Added ``--cert`` and ``--cert-key`` parameters to specify a client side
      certificate and private key for SSL
    * Improved unicode support.
    * Improved terminal color depth detection via ``curses``.
    * To make it easier to deal with Windows paths in request items, ``\``
      now only escapes special characters (the ones that are used as key-value
      separators by HTTPie).
    * Switched from ``unittest`` to ``pytest``.
    * Added Python `wheel` support.
    * Various test suite improvements.
    * Added `CONTRIBUTING`_.
    * Fixed ``User-Agent`` overwriting when used within a session.
    * Fixed handling of empty passwords in URL credentials.
    * Fixed multiple file uploads with the same form field name.
    * Fixed ``--output=/dev/null`` on Linux.
    * Miscellaneous bugfixes.
* `0.8.0`_ (2014-01-25)
    * Added ``field=@file.txt`` and ``field:=@file.json`` for embedding
      the contents of text and JSON files into request data.
    * Added curl-style shorthand for localhost.
    * Fixed request ``Host`` header value output so that it doesn't contain
      credentials, if included in the URL.
* `0.7.1`_ (2013-09-24)
    * Added ``--ignore-stdin``.
    * Added support for auth plugins.
    * Improved ``--help`` output.
    * Improved ``Content-Disposition`` parsing for ``--download`` mode.
    * Update to Requests 2.0.0
* `0.6.0`_ (2013-06-03)
    * XML data is now formatted.
    * ``--session`` and ``--session-read-only`` now also accept paths to
      session files (eg. ``http --session=/tmp/session.json example.org``).
* `0.5.1`_ (2013-05-13)
    * ``Content-*`` and ``If-*`` request headers are not stored in sessions
      anymore as they are request-specific.
* `0.5.0`_ (2013-04-27)
    * Added a `download mode`_ via ``--download``.
    * Bugfixes.
* `0.4.1`_ (2013-02-26)
    * Fixed ``setup.py``.
* `0.4.0`_ (2013-02-22)
    * Python 3.3 compatibility.
    * Requests >= v1.0.4 compatibility.
    * Added support for credentials in URL.
    * Added ``--no-option`` for every ``--option`` to be config-friendly.
    * Mutually exclusive arguments can be specified multiple times. The
      last value is used.
* `0.3.0`_ (2012-09-21)
    * Allow output redirection on Windows.
    * Added configuration file.
    * Added persistent session support.
    * Renamed ``--allow-redirects`` to ``--follow``.
    * Improved the usability of ``http --help``.
    * Fixed installation on Windows with Python 3.
    * Fixed colorized output on Windows with Python 3.
    * CRLF HTTP header field separation in the output.
    * Added exit status code ``2`` for timed-out requests.
    * Added the option to separate colorizing and formatting
      (``--pretty=all``, ``--pretty=colors`` and ``--pretty=format``).
      ``--ugly`` has bee removed in favor of ``--pretty=none``.
* `0.2.7`_ (2012-08-07)
    * Compatibility with Requests 0.13.6.
    * Streamed terminal output. ``--stream, -S`` can be used to enable
      streaming also with ``--pretty`` and to ensure a more frequent output
      flushing.
    * Support for efficient large file downloads.
    * Sort headers by name (unless ``--pretty=none``).
    * Response body is fetched only when needed (e.g., not with ``--headers``).
    * Improved content type matching.
    * Updated Solarized color scheme.
    * Windows: Added ``--output FILE`` to store output into a file
      (piping results in corrupted data on Windows).
    * Proper handling of binary requests and responses.
    * Fixed printing of ``multipart/form-data`` requests.
    * Renamed ``--traceback`` to ``--debug``.
* `0.2.6`_ (2012-07-26)
    * The short option for ``--headers`` is now ``-h`` (``-t`` has been
      removed, for usage use ``--help``).
    * Form data and URL parameters can have multiple fields with the same name
      (e.g.,``http -f url a=1 a=2``).
    * Added ``--check-status`` to exit with an error on HTTP 3xx, 4xx and
      5xx (3, 4, and 5, respectively).
    * If the output is piped to another program or redirected to a file,
      the default behaviour is to only print the response body.
      (It can still be overwritten via the ``--print`` flag.)
    * Improved highlighting of HTTP headers.
    * Added query string parameters (``param==value``).
    * Added support for terminal colors under Windows.
* `0.2.5`_ (2012-07-17)
    * Unicode characters in prettified JSON now don't get escaped for
      improved readability.
    * --auth now prompts for a password if only a username provided.
    * Added support for request payloads from a file path with automatic
      ``Content-Type`` (``http URL @/path``).
    * Fixed missing query string when displaying the request headers via
      ``--verbose``.
    * Fixed Content-Type for requests with no data.
* `0.2.2`_ (2012-06-24)
    * The ``METHOD`` positional argument can now be omitted (defaults to
      ``GET``, or to ``POST`` with data).
    * Fixed --verbose --form.
    * Added support for `Tox`_.
* `0.2.1`_ (2012-06-13)
    * Added compatibility with ``requests-0.12.1``.
    * Dropped custom JSON and HTTP lexers in favor of the ones newly included
      in ``pygments-1.5``.
* `0.2.0`_ (2012-04-25)
    * Added Python 3 support.
    * Added the ability to print the HTTP request as well as the response
      (see ``--print`` and ``--verbose``).
    * Added support for Digest authentication.
    * Added file upload support
      (``http -f POST file_field_name@/path/to/file``).
    * Improved syntax highlighting for JSON.
    * Added support for field name escaping.
    * Many bug fixes.
* `0.1.6`_ (2012-03-04)


.. _Requests: http://python-requests.org
.. _Pygments: http://pygments.org/
.. _pip: http://www.pip-installer.org/en/latest/index.html
.. _Github API: http://developer.github.com/v3/issues/comments/#create-a-comment
.. _these fine people: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/contributors
.. _Jakub Roztocil: http://subtleapps.com
.. _@jakubroztocil: https://twitter.com/jakubroztocil
.. _claudiatd/httpie-artwork: https://github.com/claudiatd/httpie-artwork
.. _0.1.6: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.1.4...0.1.6
.. _0.2.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.1.6...0.2.0
.. _0.2.1: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.0...0.2.1
.. _0.2.2: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.1...0.2.2
.. _0.2.5: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.2...0.2.5
.. _0.2.6: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.5...0.2.6
.. _0.2.7: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.5...0.2.7
.. _0.3.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.2.7...0.3.0
.. _0.4.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.3.0...0.4.0
.. _0.4.1: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.4.0...0.4.1
.. _0.5.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.4.1...0.5.0
.. _0.5.1: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.5.0...0.5.1
.. _0.6.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.5.1...0.6.0
.. _0.7.1: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.6.0...0.7.1
.. _0.8.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.7.1...0.8.0
.. _0.9.0: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.8.0...0.9.0
.. _0.9.1: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.9.0...0.9.1
.. _1.0.0-dev: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/compare/0.9.0...master
.. _LICENSE: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/blob/master/LICENSE
.. _Tox: http://tox.testrun.org
.. _CONTRIBUTING: https://github.com/jakubroztocil/httpie/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.rst


.. |version| image:: https://badge.fury.io/py/httpie.svg
    :target: http://badge.fury.io/py/httpie

.. |coverage| image:: https://coveralls.io/repos/jakubroztocil/httpie/badge.svg?branch=master
    :target: https://coveralls.io/r/jakubroztocil/httpie?branch=master

.. |unix| image:: https://api.travis-ci.org/jakubroztocil/httpie.svg
    :target: http://travis-ci.org/jakubroztocil/httpie
    :alt: Build Status of the master branch on Mac/Linux

.. |windows|  image:: https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/status/f7b5dogxuseq8srw
    :target: https://ci.appveyor.com/project/jakubroztocil/httpie
    :alt: Build Status of the master branch on Windows