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curl in python requests

Narkw Brahma

Narkw Brahma

• 1 min read

Curl in Python Requests

If you are working with APIs or web services, you might be familiar with cURL, which is a command-line tool that allows you to transfer data from or to a server. It is a very powerful tool, but sometimes it can be difficult to use and understand. Fortunately, Python provides an alternative to cURL called Requests.

Installing Requests

Before we can use Requests, we need to install it. You can install it using pip, which is the preferred package installer for Python:


pip install requests

Using Requests

Requests allows you to easily send HTTP requests and retrieve responses. Here is an example of how to use Requests to make a GET request:


import requests

response = requests.get('http://example.com')
print(response.content)

The get() method sends a GET request to the specified URL and returns a response object. The content attribute of the response object contains the content of the response in bytes. You can decode it using the decode() method:


import requests

response = requests.get('http://example.com')
content = response.content.decode('utf-8')
print(content)

You can also add parameters to your GET request using the params parameter:


import requests

params = {'key1': 'value1', 'key2': 'value2'}
response = requests.get('http://example.com', params=params)
print(response.url)

The params parameter should be a dictionary of key-value pairs. Requests will add the parameters to the URL for you.

If you need to send data in the body of a POST request, you can use the data parameter:


import requests

data = {'key1': 'value1', 'key2': 'value2'}
response = requests.post('http://example.com', data=data)
print(response.content)

The data parameter should also be a dictionary of key-value pairs. Requests will encode the data for you and send it in the body of the request.

Conclusion

Requests is a powerful and easy-to-use tool for sending HTTP requests in Python. It provides a more Pythonic way to interact with web services than cURL, and it is easier to use and understand.

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