Postman Vs Python Requests
As a software engineer, I have come across different tools that help me to test APIs or make requests to fetch data. Two popular options that come to mind are Postman and Python Requests.
Postman
Postman is a GUI-based tool that allows you to send requests and see the responses in real-time. It has a user-friendly interface that helps you to create, save and manage your requests for later use. Postman also has features such as saving environments, which allow you to switch between different variables and settings depending on the environment you are testing in.
One of the biggest advantages of Postman is that it allows you to easily create and manage collections of requests, which can be useful when testing complex APIs that require multiple requests to be made. Postman also has a built-in testing framework, which allows you to write tests for your API endpoints and validate the responses.
However, Postman does have some disadvantages. Firstly, it is a GUI-based tool, which means that it might not be suitable for automated testing or integration with other tools. Secondly, while Postman is free for personal use, it does have limitations on the number of requests you can send per day.
Python Requests
Python Requests is a library that allows you to send HTTP requests from Python code. It is a lightweight library that is easy to use and allows you to make requests programmatically. With Python Requests, you can easily make GET, POST, PUT or DELETE requests and parse the response data in your Python code.
One of the biggest advantages of Python Requests is that it is a library that can be integrated with other Python tools and frameworks. It can also be used for automated testing, as it allows you to make requests programmatically and assert the response data in your tests.
However, one disadvantage of Python Requests is that it requires some knowledge of Python programming. If you are not familiar with Python, then it might take some time to learn the language and how to use the Requests library effectively.
Conclusion
In summary, both Postman and Python Requests have their advantages and disadvantages. If you need a user-friendly tool for manual testing or creating collections of requests, then Postman is a good option. On the other hand, if you need a lightweight library for automated testing or integration with other Python tools, then Python Requests is a good choice.
# Example of using Requests library in Python
import requests
response = requests.get("https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts/1")
print(response.json())