[WEB4LIB] seeking a browser or software that will display HTTP headers

[Thomas Dowling]

At 01:51 AM 11/4/02 -0800, John Fitzgibbon wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I am interested in learning some more about the HTTP protocol, 
>specifically the conversation that takes place between the browser and the 
>web server. Is there a way of directly viewing the stream of text or 
>information that passes between the client and server when using a 
>standard browser such as Netscape, Explorer or Opera?

I have never found a way to get at this information from any of those 
browsers, which is a pity as it seems like Mozilla-based browsers could 
easily include it in their page information display.

You can download a copy of lynx from <http://lynx.browser.org/>.  Then 
try  "lynx -head http://wherever.org/ > headers.txt" or "lynx -mime_header 
http://wherever.org/ > all-content.txt".  Likewise, at least on Unix/Linux 
systems, look for a utility called wget, or two little gems called GET and 
HEAD that install as part of the Perl LWP module.



Thomas Dowling
Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu