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python post request with xml body

Narkw Brahma

Narkw Brahma

• 2 min read

Python Post Request with XML Body

If you want to send an HTTP POST request to a server and include an XML payload in the request body, you can do so using Python. Here's how:

Using the requests Library

The easiest way to send an HTTP POST request with an XML payload in Python is to use the requests library. First, you need to install the requests library using pip:

pip install requests

Once you have installed the requests library, you can use it to send an HTTP POST request with an XML payload as follows:

import requests

url = 'https://example.com/api'
xml_data = '<root><foo>bar</foo></root>'
headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/xml'}

response = requests.post(url, headers=headers, data=xml_data)

print(response.text)

In this example, we first import the requests library. We then define the URL of the server we want to send the request to and the XML data we want to include in the request body. We also define the Content-Type header as application/xml, which tells the server that the request body contains XML data.

We then send the HTTP POST request using the requests.post() method. This method takes three arguments: the URL of the server, the headers to include in the request, and the data to include in the request body.

Finally, we print out the response from the server using the response.text attribute.

Using the urllib Library

If you don't want to use the requests library, you can also send an HTTP POST request with an XML payload using the urllib library that comes with Python. Here's how:

import urllib.request

url = 'https://example.com/api'
xml_data = '<root><foo>bar</foo></root>'
headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/xml'}

req = urllib.request.Request(url, data=xml_data.encode('utf-8'), headers=headers)
response = urllib.request.urlopen(req)

print(response.read().decode('utf-8'))

In this example, we first import the urllib.request library. We then define the URL of the server we want to send the request to and the XML data we want to include in the request body. We also define the Content-Type header as application/xml, which tells the server that the request body contains XML data.

We then create a Request object using the urllib.request.Request() method. This method takes three arguments: the URL of the server, the data to include in the request body (encoded as UTF-8), and the headers to include in the request.

We then send the HTTP POST request using the urllib.request.urlopen() method. This method takes a single argument: the Request object we created earlier.

Finally, we print out the response from the server using the response.read().decode('utf-8') method.

Conclusion

Sending an HTTP POST request with an XML payload in Python is easy, whether you use the requests library or the urllib library. Just make sure you set the Content-Type header to application/xml and include your XML payload in the request body.

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