Junior
What is HTTP and what types of requests exist?
sobes.tech AI
Answer from AI
HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) is an application layer protocol for transferring hypertext and other data in distributed information systems. It is based on the "client-server" model.
Types of requests (HTTP methods):
- GET: Requests a representation of the specified resource. Should have no side effects on the server.
- HEAD: Same as GET, but the server only returns response headers without the body. Used to check the existence of a resource or its metadata.
- POST: Sends data to be processed to the specified resource. Can lead to changes in server state or side effects.
- PUT: Uploads a representation of the target resource. If the resource exists, it is updated; if not, it is created. The request body contains the representation of the resource to be placed. Idempotent.
- DELETE: Deletes the specified resource. Idempotent.
- CONNECT: Establishes a tunnel to the resource specified by the target resource. Used for SSL/TLS proxy.
- OPTIONS: Describes the communication parameters for the target resource. Used to determine the HTTP methods supported by the server.
- TRACE: Performs a remote echo test of the request path to the target resource.
Idempotency: Performing the same request multiple times results in the same server state as performing it once. GET, HEAD, PUT, and DELETE are considered idempotent. POST is not idempotent.