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Peter
Asked: 2014-03-03 20:40:43 +0800 CST

Ascertaining a GET path

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I am looking for some clarification on GET. If I have a URI such as https://google.com/something/ and I try to access that webpage, web servers interpret this as a GET request for /something/ rather than a GET for https://google.com/something/? Server access logs will commonly only log the /something/ part when visitors access the site. Yet, if I perform a curl on that full address, the internet tells me that curl is preforming a GET on the full URI. As such... what is the distinction here?

Also, what exactly does the shortened address, /something/, represent? Is it a file that resides in the root of the website being accessed? What if I set up a rewrite for /something/ to 301 to a particular address and /something/ is not actually a file or directory; how is a request like that processed?

And lastly, is https://username:[email protected]/ still the standard for accessing a website over https with http auth?

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1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Yet, if I perform a curl on that full address, the internet tells me that curl is preforming a GET on the full URI. As such... what is the distinction here?

    The HTTP request sent would look like this:

    GET /something/ HTTP/1.1
Host: google.com
...more HTTP headers here...

    curl will show you what it's sending, add -v.

    Also, what exactly does the shortened address, /something/, represent? Is it a file that resides in the root of the website being accessed? What if I set up a rewrite for /something/ to 301 to a particular address and /something/ is not actually a file or directory; how is a request like that processed?

    That's completely up to the server handling the request. All the protocol dictates is that the client is asking for the content at that location - what the server responds with is completely up to the server's implementation.

    And lastly, is https://username:[email protected]/ still the standard for accessing a website over https with http auth?

    This is one method of setting credentials to be used for basic auth; most HTTP clients will prompt for credentials if requested by the server.

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