HOWTO: Useful ASP page that sends various formats of valid HTTP response

A common problem faced by ISAPI Filter writers that buffer/modify HTTP response is to ensure that this code works for all of the valid formats of HTTP responses that can be sent by the web server.

Question:

*) Can you suggest any tools / techniques that will enable me to test all code paths. At the moment i am at the mercy of the servers in that they determine what the response format should be, i need to thoroughly test my chunked code, content-length code and non-content length.

Answer:

Sure. The following ASP page will generate all of the valid HTTP response formats to allow you to test your handling of chunked, content-length, and non-content-length (i.e. connection close) responses.

The ASP page takes in three parameters via querystring to generate the variety of valid HTTP response formats. Syntax:

• chunksize - the bytes of response data per response chunk
• numchunks - the number of response chunks to send
• type - the format of the response. Either "chunk" for chunk-encoded, "cl" for content-lengith, or "neither" for neither header, just send data and close connection

Sample requests and outputs:

• Sends 5 chunks of 10 bytes each, keep-alive possible

   WWWConnect::Connect("localhost","80")\n
  source port: 3725\n
  REQUEST: **************\n
  GET /output.asp?chunksize=10&numchunks=5&type=chunk HTTP/1.1\r\n
  Host: localhost\r\n
  Accept: */*\r\n
  \r\n
  RESPONSE: **************\n
  HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\n
  Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0\r\n
  Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 11:39:18 GMT\r\n
  Content-Type: text/html\r\n
  Set-Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDASTATTTA=PIMPPEJBIMEGJLHOBNPHMIDC; path=/\r\n
  Cache-control: private\r\n
  Transfer-Encoding: chunked\r\n
  \r\n
  a\r\n
  XXXXXXXXXX\r\n
  a\r\n
  XXXXXXXXXX\r\n
  a\r\n
  XXXXXXXXXX\r\n
  a\r\n
  XXXXXXXXXX\r\n
  a\r\n
  XXXXXXXXXX\r\n
  0\r\n
  \r\n
  finished.
  

• Sends 50 bytes with content-length, keep-alive possible

   REQUEST: **************\n
  GET /output.asp?chunksize=10&numchunks=5&type=cl HTTP/1.1\r\n
  Host: localhost\r\n
  Accept: */*\r\n
  \r\n
  RESPONSE: **************\n
  HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\n
  Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0\r\n
  Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 11:39:59 GMT\r\n
  Content-Length: 50\r\n
  Content-Type: text/html\r\n
  Set-Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDASTATTTA=AJMPPEJBCGEMEKINJEKEKAJO; path=/\r\n
  Cache-control: private\r\n
  \r\n
  XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
  finished.
  

• Sends 50 bytes without content-length and closes connection afterwards

   REQUEST: **************\n
  GET /output.asp?chunksize=10&numchunks=5&type=neither HTTP/1.1\r\n
  Host: localhost\r\n
  Accept: */*\r\n
  \r\n
  RESPONSE: **************\n
  HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\n
  Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0\r\n
  Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 11:40:25 GMT\r\n
  Connection: close\r\n
  Content-Type: text/html\r\n
  Set-Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDASTATTTA=BJMPPEJBMAANLOOIBJEOJJBA; path=/\r\n
  Cache-control: private\r\n
  \r\n
  XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
  WWWConnect::Close("localhost","80")\n
  closed source port: 3725\r\n
  finished.
  

Enjoy.

//David

 <%
DIM i, outputType, szChunk, dwRepeat

outputType = UCASE( Request.QueryString( "type" ) )
szChunk = STRING( CINT( Request.QueryString( "chunksize" ) ), "X" )
dwRepeat = CINT( Request.QueryString( "numchunks" ) )

IF outputType = "CHUNK" THEN
    Response.Buffer = false
ELSEIF outputType = "CL" THEN
    Response.Buffer = true
ELSE
    Response.Buffer = true
    Response.Flush
END IF

FOR i = 1 TO dwRepeat
    Response.Write szChunk
NEXT
%>

Comments

• Anonymous
  May 08, 2006
  Sometimes, you just want a simple test page on IIS to do some automated testing of your code that interacts...
• Anonymous
  March 26, 2010
  Hi David I have the following scenario: I have an old ASP application that needs to meet this 2 conditions.

1. That the cookie that browser is creating has the flag "secure" in the response. 2.- That the cookie that browser is creating has the flag "httponly" in the response. We were able to accomplish the first one configuring IIS but we can't accomplish the second one with classic asp. Do you have any idea or suggestion in order to accomplish the requirement no. 2? I tried a lot of stuff and nothing works.

• Anonymous
  March 10, 2011
  I was not able to find a solution for the same. I saw that some sites give Response.AddHeader. But I see that if we use that, there will be multiple cookies created. Using Response.Cookies("ddfs").path ="/;HttpOnly" encodes semicolon.  So can any one tell me what needs to be done.