HTTPS POST using CURL? Any help? Should be easy...

[brianb]

Hello,

I have a script which creates an XML file.

Now, once I create this XML file I need to POST the file to another server using the HTTPS POST protocol.

Is there a simple way of doing this?

Can anyone give me some example code to get me started?

Thanks in advance!

[tasistro]

$command='curl -F uploadfile=@/yourdir/yourXMLfile https://www.yoursite.com';

$output=$command;

Those are backtics around $command.

FROM THE man curl file

  -F/--form <name=content>
          (HTTP) This lets curl emulate a filled in form in which  a  user
          has  pressed  the  submit  button. This causes curl to POST data
          using the content-type multipart/form-data according to RFC1867.
          This  enables  uploading of binary files etc. To force the 'con-
          tent' part to be be a file, prefix the file name with an @ sign.
          To  just  get the content part from a file, prefix the file name
          with the letter <. The difference between @ and < is then that @
          makes  a  file  get attached in the post as a file upload, while
          the < makes a text field and just get the contents for that text
          field from a file.

          Example,  to send your password file to the server, where 'pass-
          word' is the name of the form-field to which /etc/passwd will be
          the input:

          curl -F password=@/etc/passwd [url]www.mypasswords.com[/url]

          To  read  the  file's content from stdin insted of a file, use -
          where the file name should've been. This goes for both @  and  <
          constructs.

          This option can be used multiple times.

[brianb]

Finally!

now I'm getting somewhere! Thanks so much!

So here's what I put in my script:

$command = 'curl -F uploadfile=@/xml/output/$current.xml https://www.WhereTheFileIsGoing.aspx';
$output = $command;

echo $output;

Is this right?

Now, the "other" server should spit back another XML file to me. Right now with this method I get nothingness. Just a blank screen. BUT NO ERRORS, so that's a good thing.

If you could assist any further to get me to SEE the output from the remote server that would be great!

Thanks again!!!!

[tasistro]

What is $current.xml? A variable? If so it isn't evaluated as such inside a single quotes.

$command = 'curl -F uploadfile=@/xml/output/$current.xml https://www.WhereTheFileIsGoing.aspx';

Try

$xmlfile='/xml/output/current.xml';
$command = 'curl -F uploadfile=@'.$xmlfile.' https://www.WhereTheFileIsGoing.aspx';

The returned data from the server should be inside $output. $output could be an array try this.

if (is_array($output)) {
$output=implode('<br>',$output);
}
echo $output;

[brianb]

Ok..

$current.xml is the file that get generated right before this curl stuff at the end of the script.

So, here's how I wrote it:

$xml_file = '/home/mortgag/public_html/xml/output/$current.xml';

$command = 'curl -F uploadfile=@'.$xml_file.' https://www.WhereTheFileIsGoing.aspx';
$output = $command;

if (is_array($output)) {
$output = implode('<br>',$output);
}

echo $output;

Now...I'm not sure what's happening as I keep getting a blank return when the script finishes.

Does the file I'm uploading have to be pointed to by an absolute server path, or only the absolute web path?

The server I'm sending this file to is supposed to spit back an XML file, but I keep getting a blank page.

Any ideas what's going on? Is there a way for me to tell what's going on to debug this thing?

Thanks again for everything.

[tasistro]

Try adding the -v parameter to make curl more verbose and post what is happening. On a side note those that site require other parameters and / or user authentication?

[brianb]

Hi...

I'm about 99% sure the site DOES NOT require any authentication.

So, the -v parameter. How would that look in the code if I were to implement it?

[tasistro]

This is what the output should look like. In this case I'm using a proxy, but the info should be the same. I intentionally faulted the request so the proxy returns an error. I your case you should get somewhat different response, but the verbose output should be similar

• About to connect() to 192.168.0.1:3128
• Connected to 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1) port 3128

POST http://www.mysite.com/blabla.php4 HTTP/1.1
Authorization: Basic ZWZlbGRoYXVzOmFuZWwxMjM0
User-Agent: curl/7.10.3 (i586-mandrake-linux-gnu) libcurl/7.10.3 OpenSSL/0.9.7a zlib/1.1.4
Host: www.mysite.com
Pragma: no-cache
Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, /
Content-Length: 82026
Expect: 100-continue
Content-Type: multipart/form-data; boundary=curlylYf73JSSRkCUmJXSPQGbZQMm1q

% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Curr.
Dload Upload Total Current Left Speed
1 83263 100 1237 0 0 28113 0 0:00:00 0:00:00 0:00:00 0
* Closing connection #0
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
<HTML><HEAD><META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<TITLE>ERROR: The requested URL could not be retrieved</TITLE>
<STYLE type="text/css"><!--BODY{background-color:#ffffff;font-family:verdana,sans-serif}PRE{font-family:sans-serif}--></STYLE>
</HEAD><BODY>
<H2>The requested URL could not be retrieved</H2>
<HR noshade size="1px">
<P>
While trying to retrieve the URL:
<A HREF="http://www.mysite.com</A>
<P>
The following error was encountered:
<BLOCKQUOTE>
Unable to determine IP address from host name for
<I>www.mysite.com</I>
</BLOCKQUOTE>

<P>
The dnsserver returned:
<BLOCKQUOTE>
Name Error: The domain name does not exist.
</BLOCKQUOTE>

<P>
This means that:
<PRE>
The cache was not able to resolve the hostname presented in the URL.
Check if the address is correct.
</PRE>
<P>Your cache administrator is <A HREF="mailto:root">root</A>.

<BR clear="all">
<HR noshade size="1px">
<ADDRESS>
Generated Thu, 24 Jul 2003 17:59:26 GMT by gateway.myoffice.com (squid/2.5.STABLE1-20030121)
</ADDRESS>
</BODY></HTML>

[brianb]

Ok...

After speaking with the 'other' server administrator, we have come to the conclusion that I DO need a username and password.

So, how do I implement a username / password scheme into the code?

Thanks.

[magister]

did you ever find a solution to this???

[magister]

did you ever find a solution to this???

[magister]

did you ever find a solution to this???