Server Exchange

[Rod Macia]

Some examples to make this clear using Post 36 PB source
and this PHP file

are using "https://camcopng.com/getfile.php"
or you created a new php

[Stuart McLachlan]

if you are using Stuat's Post function
wsrequest = "select rowid from parts where rowid % 1000 = 0 order by rowid;"
You should URL encode your request
wsrequest = "select%20rowid%20from%20parts%20where%20rowid%20%25%201000%20%3D%200%20order%20by%20rowid%3B"

If you are using POST, your request would normally should take the form"&key=value....." so that you can extract the data from the request.

If you want to pass a single string sucvh as an SQL statement to a PHP page without using parameters keys and values, this works fine

wsrequest = "select rowid from parts where rowid % 1000 = 0 order by rowid;"

and

<?php
$data = file_get_contents('php://input');
echo $data;
?>​​

[Stuart McLachlan]

are using "https://camcopng.com/getfile.php"
or you created a new php

Sorry, all of my subsequent PHP examples have only been run/tested locally on my machine (using http://test.test/argtest2.php , ..../argtest3.php etc ) I hadn't loaded them up to the Camco website.

Added:
OK, I've just uploaded the last one as argtest5.php to https://camcopng.com

<?php
$data = file_get_contents('php://input');
echo $data;
?>​​​

[Gary Beene]

Howdy, Stuart!

But only if you have downloaded the wget utility and placed it in the same directory as your executable or in a directory in your path. :

Yes, and a 3MB file at that - part of the unsatisfactory nature of that solution.

For the case of a PHP that doesn't return anything (just takes an action on the server and closes), I really expected there would be a simple API to call the PHP.

Well, not having found anything simpler to attract my attention, I'll focus on IWinHttpRequest. It appears to work and has the option of returning content without the kludge of saving a file.

Thanks again!

[Stuart McLachlan]

For the case of a PHP that doesn't return anything (just takes an action on the server and closes), I really expected there would be a simple API to call the PHP.

Depends on what you mean by "simple".
There's the "flat" as opposed to "com" API WinInet.inc which has a HTTPSENDREQUEST function, but you still need to go through all the other bits of establising a connection to the server, populating the request and checking the result.

José covered it fairly thoroughly years ago:
https://forum.powerbasic.com/forum/j...ples#post51695

Remember, what you are doing is talking to a web server, which has to pass your request on to a script, be it PHP,Perl, Python,CGI or whatever. You can't directly access anything executable on a web server other than the server service itself on Port 80 using the HTTP protocol.

This seens pretty simple to me:
'

FUNCTION PostData(wsURL AS WSTRING, wsData AS WSTRING) AS WSTRING
    'retrieve the posted data in your PHP file with:  $data = file_get_contents('php://input');
    DIM pHttpReq AS IWinHttpRequest
    pHttpReq = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"
    IF ISNOTHING(pHttpReq) THEN FUNCTION = "WinHttpRequest.5.1 failure" :EXIT FUNCTION
    TRY
       pHttpReq.Open "POST", wsURL, 0
       pHttpReq.SetRequestHeader "Content-Type","application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
       pHttpReq.Send(wsData)
       IF pHttpReq.StatusText = "" THEN
            FUNCTION = "No response From Server" :EXIT FUNCTION
       ELSE
            FUNCTION =  pHttpReq.StatusText:EXIT FUNCTION
       END IF
    CATCH
        FUNCTION =  OBJRESULT$(OBJRESULT)
    END TRY
 END FUNCTION
'

or without any error checking,it's a "fairly simple api"
'

FUNCTION PostData(wsURL AS WSTRING, wsData AS WSTRING) AS WSTRING
    DIM pHttpReq AS IWinHttpRequest
    pHttpReq = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"
    pHttpReq.Open "POST", wsURL, 0
    pHttpReq.SetRequestHeader "Content-Type","application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
    pHttpReq.Send(wsData)
 END FUNCTION
'

.
.

[Rod Macia]

Stuart, in the above functions where are you getting the response?
I assume you wanted to reuse wsData both to pass the request, and get the response.
you have no wsData = pHttpReq.ResponseText

Gary I strongly recommend you use the version with error checking. In a recent thread Mike was having an Issue with TLS version, and the error checking steered me in the wright direction to locate cause.

Just copy the function into your "myInternetStuff.inc" or make it into an SLL, Forget about it, and then you have a one-liner you love so much.


wsdata="param1=rabbit" :PostData("http://myserver.com/lookup.php", wsData) : ? wsdata

[Mike Doty]

WinhttpGet can be a 1-liner as far as calling and displaying results or exiting on error.
It works with protected pages and cgi programs to send a request and return a file or request as a string.

#INCLUDE "httprequest.inc" 'WinHttpGet.bas
#INCLUDE "ole2utils.inc"

FUNCTION PBMAIN()
 IF ISFALSE(WinHttpGet("https://dotysoftware.com/test.txt","","","",sData$,sError$)) THEN ? sData$,,sError$
END FUNCTION

FUNCTION WinHttpGet(sURL AS STRING,_
          sUserName      AS STRING,_
          sPassword      AS STRING,_
          sRequest       AS STRING,_
          sDataReturned  AS STRING,_
          sError         AS STRING) AS LONG
'https://forum.powerbasic.com/forum/jose-s-corner/source-code-ab/51694-winhhtp-com-examples
'https://www.808.dk/?code-simplewinhttprequest
 LOCAL pHttpReq AS IWinHttpRequest
 pHttpReq = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"
 IF ISNOTHING(pHttpReq) THEN ? "WinHttpRequest.5.1 failure",%MB_ICONERROR OR %MB_SYSTEMMODAL,FUNCNAME$:EXIT FUNCTION
 TRY
  pHttpReq.Open "GET", sURL + sRequest, 0
  IF LEN(sUserName)AND LEN(sPassword) THEN
    pHttpReq.SetCredentials sUserName,sPassword,%HTTPREQUEST_SETCREDENTIALS_FOR_SERVER
  END IF
  pHttpReq.Send
  IF pHttpReq.StatusText <> "OK" THEN
   sError = pHttpReq.StatusText
   FUNCTION = 1
  ELSE
   sDataReturned = pHttpReq.ResponseText
   sError = pHttpReq.StatusText
  END IF
 CATCH
  OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
  FUNCTION = 1
 END TRY
 SET phttpReq = NOTHING
END FUNCTION

[Stuart McLachlan]

Stuart, in the above functions where are you getting the response?

I'm not. This was for Gray's "For the case of a PHP that doesn't return anything (just takes an action on the server and closes"
The only "response" is the returned HTTP StatusText.

Try using that function to this one line PHP file: Hopefully your data is appended to logfile.txt and you get an "OK" messagebox

<?php file_put_contents('logfile.txt',file_get_contents('php://input')."\r\n",FILE_APPEND); ?>

Or if you're not interested in error trapping and a response, try this minimalist code with that one line PHP file
'

#INCLUDE "httprequest.inc"
FUNCTION PBMAIN() AS LONG
    Postdata("http://test.test/argTest4.php",DATE$ & " " & TIME$ & ": " & "Some data for the log file")
END FUNCTION

FUNCTION PostData(wsURL AS WSTRING, wsData AS WSTRING) AS WSTRING
    DIM pHttpReq AS IWinHttpRequest
    pHttpReq = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"
    pHttpReq.Open "POST", wsURL, 0
    pHttpReq.SetRequestHeader "Content-Type","application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
    pHttpReq.Send(wsData)
 END FUNCTION
'

[Rod Macia]

I'm not. This was for Gray's "For the case of a PHP that doesn't return anything (just takes an action on the server and closes"
The only "response" is the returned HTTP StatusText.

I know you are responding to Gary's minimalistic views.
Fundamentally that would be ill-advised, the Post request can succeed at the HTTP level, which would generate a positive "response" in the returned HTTP StatusText, but the PHP may fail to complete as expected, an you would not know about it. The PHP should return some sort of OK/NOT OK message.

[Stuart McLachlan]

Reviewing some code, I just noticed that I had copied a pointless test from this post:

...
FUNCTION GetOrPost(GetMethod AS LONG ,_
...
IF GetMethod THEN
pHttpReq.Open "GET", wsURL + wsRequest, 0
ELSE
pHttpReq.Open "POST", wsURL + wsRequest, 0
END IF
...
iSucceeded = pHttpReq.WaitForResponse(5) 'added 9/22/22
...

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/winhttp/iwinhttprequest-open

Async [in, optional]
Indicates whether to open in asynchronous mode.
Value Meaning
VARIANT_FALSE Opens the HTTP connection in synchronous mode. A call to Send does not return until WinHTTP has completely received the response.
VARIANT_TRUE Opens the HTTP connection in asynchronous mode.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/winhttp/iwinhttprequest-waitforresponse

The WaitForResponse method waits for an asynchronous Send method to complete, with optional time-out value, in seconds.
Calling this property after a synchronous Send method returns immediately and has no effect.

IOW, since the connection is being opened with "0", (i.e. False = synchronous), the WaitforResponse in this code does nothing.

[Stuart McLachlan]

I know you are responding to Gary's minimalistic views.
Fundamentally that would be ill-advised, the Post request can succeed at the HTTP level, which would generate a positive "response" in the returned HTTP StatusText, but the PHP may fail to complete as expected, an you would not know about it. The PHP should return some sort of OK/NOT OK message.

I agree 100% with your philosophy.
I'd never actually do something like that in production code, but he did ask

[Mike Doty]

http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0052.htm

WinhttpGet "http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0052.htm","","","",sdata,sError

This is the CATCH of the TRY statement. OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
This error message box displays without OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
Is there a way to suppress this message box and get the data from the above link?

If the function can download an .exe file, why does it choke on a .htm file?
Is there some setting to allow any file extension without error checking for characters?

[Rod Macia]

I don't know if you can suppress the error message, but you can use pWHttp.ResponseBody instead of pWHttp.Responsetext

'

#COMPILE EXE    'Jose Roca Includes
#DIM ALL
#UNIQUE VAR ON

%Unicode = 1
FUNCTION PBMAIN () AS LONG
LOCAL sBuffer AS WSTRING
        sBuffer = GetHTTPsfromWEB("http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0052.htm")
        CLIPBOARD SET TEXT sBuffer
        ? sBuffer
END FUNCTION

#INCLUDE ONCE "httprequest.inc"
#INCLUDE ONCE "ole2utils.inc"
'-----------------------------------------------
FUNCTION GetHTTPsfromWEB (sFullURL AS STRING) AS WSTRING
'-----------------------------------------------
' GetHTTPsfromWEB
' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB (sFullURL)
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB ("https:/www.mydomain.com/whatever.html)
   LOCAL pWHttp AS IWinHttpRequest
   LOCAL buffer AS STRING
   LOCAL vBody AS VARIANT
   LOCAL nBytes AS LONG
   LOCAL iSucceeded AS INTEGER
   DIM   vByteArray(0) AS BYTE

   ' Creates an instance of the HTTP service
   pWHttp = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"

   IF ISNOTHING(pWHttp) THEN EXIT FUNCTION
   TRY
      ' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
      pWHttp.Open "GET", sFullURL
      ' Sends an HTTP request to the HTTP server
      pWHttp.Send
      ' Wait for response with a timeout of 5 seconds
      iSucceeded = pWHttp.WaitForResponse(5)
        ' buffer = pWHttp.Responsetext
         vBody = pWHttp.ResponseBody
          ' Convert the variant to an array of bytes
          vByteArray() = vBody
          ' Convert the array of bytes to a string
          nBytes = UBOUND(vByteArray) - LBOUND(vByteArray) + 1
          IF nBytes THEN
             buffer = PEEK$(VARPTR(vByteArray(0)), nBytes)
          END IF
   CATCH
      OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
   END TRY
FUNCTION = buffer
END FUNCTION
'-----------------------------------------------
' GetHTTPsfromWEB                            End
'-----------------------------------------------
'

[Mike Doty]

Great!!, Rod.
1. Could not get clipboard to correctly display so writes to disk and shellexecute

2. Added returning error code
sStatus = pWHttp.StatusText
IF sStatus <> "OK" THEN EXIT TRY

3. Not sure if CATCH will ever fire (not a bad thing!)

#COMPILE EXE "gary2"  'Jose Roca Includes
#DIM ALL
#UNIQUE VAR ON
#INCLUDE ONCE "httprequest.inc"
#INCLUDE ONCE "ole2utils.inc"
%Unicode = 1
%ShellOut = 1  'new window opened with each file
MACRO mFormat(value,length) = RSET$(FORMAT$(value),length USING "0")

FUNCTION PBMAIN () AS LONG
 MKDIR "c:\gary2"
 CHDIR "c:\gary2"
 LOCAL sUrl,sBuffer ,sFileName,snum,sStatus AS STRING
 LOCAL x AS LONG
  x = 52
  snum = mFormat(x,4)
  sUrl = "http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets" + snum + ".htm"
  sBuffer = GetHTTPsfromWEB(sUrl,sStatus)
  IF sStatus = "OK" THEN
   sFileName = snum + ".htm"
   OPEN sFileName FOR OUTPUT AS #1
   PRINT #1,sBuffer;
   CLOSE #1
   IF %ShellOut THEN  ShellExecute (%NULL, "OPEN", sFileName + $NUL, BYVAL %NULL, CURDIR$, %SW_SHOWNORMAL)
  ELSE
   ? sStatus,%MB_ICONERROR,"Error"
  END IF
  ? "Done",%MB_SYSTEMMODAL
END FUNCTION
'-----------------------------------------------
FUNCTION GetHTTPsfromWEB (sFullURL AS STRING,sStatus AS STRING) AS WSTRING
'-----------------------------------------------
' GetHTTPsfromWEB
' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB (sFullURL)
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB ("https:/www.mydomain.com/whatever.html)
   LOCAL pWHttp AS IWinHttpRequest
   LOCAL buffer AS STRING
   LOCAL vBody AS VARIANT
   LOCAL nBytes AS LONG
   LOCAL iSucceeded AS INTEGER
   DIM   vByteArray(0) AS BYTE

   ' Creates an instance of the HTTP service
   pWHttp = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"

   IF ISNOTHING(pWHttp) THEN EXIT FUNCTION
   TRY
      ' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
      pWHttp.Open "GET", sFullURL
      ' Sends an HTTP request to the HTTP server
      pWHttp.SetRequestHeader "Content-Type","application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
      pWHttp.Send
      ' Wait for response with a timeout of 5 seconds
        iSucceeded = pWHttp.WaitForResponse(5) 'always returns -1
        ' buffer = pWHttp.Responsetext
         vBody = pWHttp.ResponseBody
         sStatus = pWHttp.StatusText
         IF sStatus <> "OK" THEN EXIT TRY
         ' Convert the variant to an array of bytes
          vByteArray() = vBody
          ' Convert the array of bytes to a string
          nBytes = UBOUND(vByteArray) - LBOUND(vByteArray) + 1
          IF nBytes THEN
             buffer = PEEK$(VARPTR(vByteArray(0)), nBytes)
          END IF
   CATCH
    ? "Never executes"
    OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
   END TRY
FUNCTION = buffer
END FUNCTION
'-----------------------------------------------
' GetHTTPsfromWEB                            End
'-----------------------------------------------

[Stuart McLachlan]

http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0052.htm

WinhttpGet "http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0052.htm","","","",sdata,sError

This is the CATCH of the TRY statement. OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT
This error message box displays without OleShowErrorInfo OBJRESULT

I think you are mistaken.
Comment out that line and you don't get it.
Incidentally, there is no need for # INCLUDE "ole2utils.inc" and OleSHowErrorInfo with current PBs.
Just remove the #I INCLUDE and replace the line with ? OBJRESULT$() or $ str$(OBJRESULT) & " : : & OBJRESULT$) and you will get a simpler message

Is there a way to suppress this message box and get the data from the above link?

Suppress? - yes, see above.
Get the data? - The problem is the page content. Even FF can't display the weird characters byte codes that are embedded in it. They are not valid UTF (either 8 or 16) !




The error is occuring when pHttpReq.ResponseText is trying to make sense of those bytes.

If the function can download an .exe file, why does it choke on a .htm file?
Is there some setting to allow any file extension without error checking for characters?

Not as long as the server is saying that it is HTML text encoded as UTF8

[Stuart McLachlan]

Great!!, Rod.
1. Could not get clipboard to correctly display so writes to disk and shellexecute

Clipboard won't display correctly because of the invalid UTF codes
We've fortunate that modern browsers are very forgiving when they try to display what is returned by the server

[Stuart McLachlan]

Gary's page contains &HA0 characters = CHR$ (160) = ANSI "Nobreak Space". It is not a valid UTF value- that's what is messing up to saving to ResponseText and the display when the server says that it is delivering UTF text.

As a general rule, you should NOT include such characters ini a web page. If you do, you need to put a "<meta charset= Windows-1252>" or similar in the headers
I'm not suprised that people have problems with some of Gary's pages. The one in question is very deficient All it contains is:

<html><body>​
...

which goes against just about every rule of structuring an HTML page.

When it is saved using Mikes Post 94 and opened in a browser with ShellExecute, the browser doesn't know what form it is in but interprets it as ANSI text and so displays the non breaking spaces. Unfortunately his web server doesn't second guess his content, assumes that he has done the right thing and declares it as the default Content-Type text/html; charset=UTF-8.

[Mike Doty]

Rod and Stuart,
Setting credentials when not needed is even correctly handled without an unsightly message box or crash.
Replace all AS STRING with AS WSTRING. It works either way.

#COMPILE EXE   'Jose Roca Includes
#INCLUDE "windows.inc"
#INCLUDE ONCE "httprequest.inc"
'MACRO mFormat(value,length) = RSET$(FORMAT$(value),length USING "0")

FUNCTION PBMAIN () AS LONG
 LOCAL sURL,sBuffer,sError,sUserName,sPassword AS STRING
 sURL = "http://www.garybeene.com/power/code/gbsnippets0054.htm"
 sUserName = ""
 sPassword = ""
 sBuffer = GetHTTPsfromWEB(sUrl,sError,sUserName,sPassword)
 ? USING$("&&#, bytes returned",sURL,$CRLF,LEN(sBuffer)),,sError
END FUNCTION

FUNCTION GetHTTPsfromWEB _
          (sFullURL  AS STRING, _
           sError    AS STRING, _
           sUserName AS STRING,_
           sPassword AS STRING) AS STRING
 RESET sError
' GetHTTPsfromWEB
' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB (sFullURL)
' Usage     GetHTTPsfromWEB ("https:/www.mydomain.com/whatever.html)
 LOCAL pWHttp      AS IWinHttpRequest
 LOCAL sbuffer     AS STRING
 LOCAL vBody       AS VARIANT
 LOCAL nBytes      AS LONG
 LOCAL iSucceeded  AS INTEGER
 DIM vByteArray(0) AS BYTE

 ' Creates an instance of the HTTP service
 pWHttp = NEWCOM "WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1"

 IF ISNOTHING(pWHttp) THEN EXIT FUNCTION
 TRY
  ' Opens an HTTP or HTTPS connection to an HTTP resource
  pWHttp.Open "GET", sFullURL
  IF LEN(sUserName)AND LEN(sPassword) THEN
   pWHttp.SetCredentials sUserName,sPassword,%HTTPREQUEST_SETCREDENTIALS_FOR_SERVER
  END IF
  ' Sends an HTTP request to the HTTP server
  pWHttp.SetRequestHeader "Content-Type","application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
  pWHttp.Send
  ' Wait for response with a timeout of 5 seconds
  iSucceeded = pWHttp.WaitForResponse(5) 'always returns -1

  vBody = pWHttp.ResponseBody 'Stuart
  sError = pWHttp.StatusText
  IF sError <> "OK" THEN EXIT TRY
  ' Convert the variant to an array of bytes
  vByteArray() = vBody
  ' Convert the array of bytes to a string
  nBytes = UBOUND(vByteArray) - LBOUND(vByteArray) + 1
  IF nBytes THEN sbuffer = PEEK$(VARPTR(vByteArray(0)), nBytes)
  CATCH
   sError = OBJRESULT$ 'parameters invalid ...
  END TRY
FUNCTION = sbuffer
END FUNCTION

[Stuart McLachlan]

vBody = pWHttp.ResponseBody
sError = pWHttp.StatusText
IF sError <> "OK" THEN EXIT TRY
' Convert the variant to an array of bytes
vByteArray() = vBody
' Convert the array of bytes to a string
nBytes = UBOUND(vByteArray) - LBOUND(vByteArray) + 1
IF nBytes THEN sbuffer = PEEK$(VARPTR(vByteArray(0)), nBytes)

That will not work if a the site is encoded/transmitted as UTF8 with values > 127 or as UTF16.
It works with Gary's pages because his are plain single byte ANSI text. In a UTF8 page, his CHR$(160) would be encoded as &HC2A0, not just &HA0. In a UTF16 page, it would be &H00A0

[Mike Doty]

That will not work if the the site is UTF8 encoded with values > 127 or if it is UTF16 encoded.

The whole thing won't work or not using WSTRING?