Should I URL-encode POST data?

Question

I'm POSTing data to an external API (using PHP, if it's relevant).

Should I URL-encode the POST variables that I pass?

Or do I only need to URL-encode GET data?

Thanks!

UPDATE: This is my PHP, in case it is relevant:

$fields = array(
    'mediaupload'=>$file_field,
    'username'=>urlencode($_POST["username"]),
    'password'=>urlencode($_POST["password"]),
    'latitude'=>urlencode($_POST["latitude"]),
    'longitude'=>urlencode($_POST["longitude"]),
    'datetime'=>urlencode($_POST["datetime"]),
    'category'=>urlencode($_POST["category"]),
    'metacategory'=>urlencode($_POST["metacategory"]),
    'caption'=>($_POST["description"])
);
$fields_string = http_build_query($fields);
$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,$url);
curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_POST,count($fields));
curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS,$fields);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
$response = curl_exec($ch);

Answer 1

General Answer

The general answer to your question is that it depends. And you get to decide by specifying what your "Content-Type" is in the HTTP headers.

A value of "application/x-www-form-urlencoded" means that your POST body will need to be URL encoded just like a GET parameter string. A value of "multipart/form-data" means that you'll be using content delimiters and NOT url encoding the content.

This answer has a much more thorough explanation if you'd like more information.

---

Specific Answer

For an answer specific to the PHP libraries you're using (CURL), you should read the documentation here.

Here's the relevant information:

CURLOPT_POST

TRUE to do a regular HTTP POST. This POST is the normal application/x-www-form-urlencoded kind, most commonly used by HTML forms.

CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS

The full data to post in a HTTP "POST" operation. To post a file, prepend a filename with @ and use the full path. The filetype can be explicitly specified by following the filename with the type in the format ';type=mimetype'. This parameter can either be passed as a urlencoded string like 'para1=val1&para2=val2&...' or as an array with the field name as key and field data as value. If value is an array, the Content-Type header will be set to multipart/form-data. As of PHP 5.2.0, value must be an array if files are passed to this option with the @ prefix.

Answer 2

curl will encode the data for you, just drop your raw field data into the fields array and tell it to "go".

Answer 3

Above posts answers questions related to URL Encoding and How it works, but the original questions was "Should I URL-encode POST data?" which isn't answered.

From my recent experience with URL Encoding, I would like to extend the question further. "Should I URL-encode POST data, same as GET HTTP method. Generally, HTML Forms over the Browser if are filled, submitted and/or GET some information, Browsers will do URL Encoding but If an application exposes a web-service and expects Consumers to do URL-Encoding on data, is it Architecturally and Technically correct to do URL Encode with POST HTTP method ?"

Answer 4

@DougW has clearly answered this question, but I still like to add some codes here to explain Doug's points. (And correct errors in the code above)

Solution 1: URL-encode the POST data with a content-type header :application/x-www-form-urlencoded .

Note: you do not need to urlencode $_POST[] fields one by one, http_build_query() function can do the urlencoding job nicely.

$fields = array(
    'mediaupload'=>$file_field,
    'username'=>$_POST["username"],
    'password'=>$_POST["password"],
    'latitude'=>$_POST["latitude"],
    'longitude'=>$_POST["longitude"],
    'datetime'=>$_POST["datetime"],
    'category'=>$_POST["category"],
    'metacategory'=>$_POST["metacategory"],
    'caption'=>$_POST["description"]
);

$fields_string = http_build_query($fields);

$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,$url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST,1);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS,$fields_string);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
$response = curl_exec($ch);

Solution 2: Pass the array directly as the post data without URL-encoding, while the Content-Type header will be set to multipart/form-data.

$fields = array(
        'mediaupload'=>$file_field,
        'username'=>$_POST["username"],
        'password'=>$_POST["password"],
        'latitude'=>$_POST["latitude"],
        'longitude'=>$_POST["longitude"],
        'datetime'=>$_POST["datetime"],
        'category'=>$_POST["category"],
        'metacategory'=>$_POST["metacategory"],
        'caption'=>$_POST["description"]
    );

    $ch = curl_init();
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,$url);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST,1);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS,$fields);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
    $response = curl_exec($ch);

Both code snippets work, but using different HTTP headers and bodies.