HTTP::Request - HTTP style request message

- NAME
- SYNOPSIS
- DESCRIPTION
- SEE ALSO
- COPYRIGHT

# NAME

HTTP::Request - HTTP style request message

# SYNOPSIS

     require HTTP::Request;
     $request = HTTP::Request->new(GET => 'http://www.example.com/');

and usually used like this:

     $ua = LWP::UserAgent->new;
     $response = $ua->request($request);

# DESCRIPTION

`HTTP::Request` is a class encapsulating HTTP style requests, consisting of a request line, some headers, and a content body. Note that the LWP library uses HTTP style requests even for non-HTTP protocols. Instances of this class are usually passed to the `request()` method of an `LWP::UserAgent` object.

`HTTP::Request` is a subclass of `HTTP::Message` and therefore inherits its methods. The following additional methods are available:

$r = HTTP::Request->new( $method, $uri )
$r = HTTP::Request->new( $method, $uri, $header )
$r = HTTP::Request->new( $method, $uri, $header, $content )

  Constructs a new `HTTP::Request` object describing a request on the object $uri using method $method. The $method argument must be a string. The $uri argument can be either a string, or a reference to a `URI` object. The optional $header argument should be a reference to an `HTTP::Headers` object or a plain array reference of key/value pairs. The optional $content argument should be a string of bytes.

$r = HTTP::Request->parse( $str )

  This constructs a new request object by parsing the given string.

$r->method
$r->method( $val )

  This is used to get/set the method attribute. The method should be a short string like ``GET'', ``HEAD'', ``PUT'' or ``POST''.

$r->uri
$r->uri( $val )

  This is used to get/set the uri attribute. The $val can be a reference to a URI object or a plain string. If a string is given, then it should be parseable as an absolute URI.

$r->header( $field )
$r->header( $field => $value )

  This is used to get/set header values and it is inherited from `HTTP::Headers` via `HTTP::Message`. See the HTTP::Headers manpage for details and other similar methods that can be used to access the headers.

$r->content
$r->content( $content )

  This is used to get/set the content and it is inherited from the `HTTP::Message` base class. See the HTTP::Message manpage for details and other methods that can be used to access the content.

  Note that the content should be a string of bytes. Strings in perl can contain characters outside the range of a byte. The `Encode` module can be used to turn such strings into a string of bytes.

$r->as_string
$r->as_string( $eol )

  Method returning a textual representation of the request.

# SEE ALSO

the HTTP::Headers manpage, the HTTP::Message manpage, the HTTP::Request::Common manpage, the HTTP::Response manpage

# COPYRIGHT

Copyright 1995-2004 Gisle Aas.

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

HTTP::Request - HTTP style request message