Understanding HTTP Protocol | HTTP request and response messages

 

Understanding HTTP

Greetings reader! Today we will discuss about one of the most fundamental and foundational part of the World Wide Web - Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP)

The concept of Hyper Text Transfer Protocol isn’t something new. HTTP have been a part of the World Wide Web for many decades now. Imaging internet in the absence of http is almost impossible, thus it becomes necessary to understand the basic functionality of this networking  protocol.

In this article we will be overviewing the HTTP  protocol, what are HTTP messages and How they work?  

WHAT IS HTTP?

HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol) is a Networking Protocol which was initially developed by Tim Berners Lee and his team in the year 1991. HTTP makes the foundation of data communications of the WWW. 

It functions as a request and response protocol, underlid by TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) in the OSI model (Open Source Interconnection)

HTTP Features

By default network systems and web services use port 80 as the default HTTP port, and port 443 as the default HTTPS port. This have become a convention for simpler interactions between systems, however HTTP can be also be configured to be used in different ports too. 

 

HTTP 1.1 was the conventional version of the protocol which was used earlier, the current version being used in modern day network systems is the ‘HTTP 2.0’ which provides some very useful functions and more HTTP Methods. 

HTTP Messages

Http is a part of Application Layer of the OSI Model and works as a request and response protocol. For establishing a connection between two network systems, a HTTP request is made by the client which is accepted by the server, and the request resources or pages are then displayed.

Client Request : The HTTP client sends a request message formatted according to the rules of the HTTP Standard – an HTTP request. This request message specifies the resources that the client wishes to retrieve, or includes the information to be displayed or provided by the server.

 

Server Response : The server reads and interprets the request made by client. It takes action relevant to the request and makes an HTTP response message, which it sends back to the client. The response message indicates whether the request was successful, and may also contain the content of the resources that the client had requested, if appropriate.

HTTP 2.0

 

Unlike the older version of HTTP, i.e. HTTP 1.1, the HTTP 2.0 is now being used in modern day networks. 

It came with several powerful functions and eliminated some major drawbacks of the older versions. HTTP 2.0 supports various useful features and functions like:

Persistent Connections

Byte Range Requests

Caching and Proxy Support

More HTTP Methods

Multiple Hosts Name Support