Possible Duplicate:
HTTP GET with request body
I've read few discussions here which do not advocate sending content via HTTP GET. There are restrictions on the size of data that can be sent via clients (web browsers). And handling GET data also depends on servers. Please refer section Resources below.
However, I've been asked to test the possibility to send content via HTTP GET using RestTemplate. I refered few discussions on spring forum but they were not answered. (Please note sending data via http Post works fine). The discussion here suggests using POST instead.
dev env - JBoss AS 5.1, Spring 3.1.3
Client
@Test
public void testGetWithBody()
{
// acceptable media type
List<MediaType> acceptableMediaTypes = new ArrayList<MediaType>();
acceptableMediaTypes.add(MediaType.TEXT_PLAIN);
// header
HttpHeaders headers = new HttpHeaders();
headers.setAccept(acceptableMediaTypes);
// body
String body = "hello world";
HttpEntity<String> entity = new HttpEntity<String>(body, headers);
Map<String, Object> uriVariables = new HashMap<String, Object>();
uriVariables.put("id", "testFile");
// Send the request as GET
ResponseEntity<String> result = restTemplate.exchange(
"http://localhost:8080/WebApp/test/{id}/body",
HttpMethod.GET, entity, String.class, uriVariables);
Assert.assertNotNull(result.getBody());
}
Server @Controller
@RequestMapping(value = "/{id}/body", method = RequestMethod.GET)
public @ResponseBody
String testGetWithBody(@PathVariable String id,
@RequestBody String bodyContent)
{
return id + bodyContent;
}
The problem - executing this test case returns 500 Internal Server Error. On debugging, I found that the controller is not hit.
Is it correct to understand that the RestTemplate provides the way to send data as request body, but the error occurs because the server could not handle the request body ?
If the request body sent via HTTP Get is not conventional why does RestTemplate provide the APIs to allow sending it ? Does this mean there are few servers capable of handling the Request body via GET ?
Resources - discussions on sending body via HTTP GET using RestTemplate at spring forum
http://forum.springsource.org/showthread.php?129510-Message-body-with-HTTP-GET&highlight=resttemplate+http+get
http://forum.springsource.org/showthread.php?94201-GET-method-on-RestTemplate-exchange-with-a-Body&highlight=resttemplate+http+get
Resources - General discussions on sending body via HTTP GET
get-with-request-body
is-this-statement-correct-http-get-method-always-has-no-message-body
get-or-post-when-reading-request-body
http-uri-get-limit