As I understand HTTPAUTH, if I get a URL and the server returns a 401 response with a "WWW-Authenticate" header, I should resend the request with an Authorization header. And if I understand curl, it's supposed to be able to construct the Authorization header behind the scenes.

I've found that whenever I do this, when I call perform on the second request, curl actually sends 2 requests - one with Authorization and one without.

Here's a small test case using python:

#!/usr/bin/env python
from pycurl import *

def sendRequest(headerCallback, authtype = HTTPAUTH_NONE, username = "", password = ""):
    def swallow(buf):
        pass
    curl = Curl()
    curl.setopt(WRITEFUNCTION, swallow)
    curl.setopt(HEADERFUNCTION, headerCallback)
    curl.setopt(URL, "http://localhost/test2.php")
    if authtype != HTTPAUTH_NONE:
        curl.setopt(HTTPAUTH, authtype)
        curl.setopt(USERPWD, username + ":" + password)
    curl.perform()

def printHeaders(buf):
    print "Header: " + buf.strip()
    if buf.lower().find("www-authenticate") >= 0:
        raw_input("Hit enter to continue")
        sendRequest(printHeaders2, HTTPAUTH_DIGEST, "guest", "guest")

def printHeaders2(buf):
    print "Header2: " + buf.strip()

sendRequest(printHeaders)

When I run this, I see this output in my server logs (including "req: <Authorization header from request> resp: <WWW-Authenticate header from response>")

127.0.0.1 - - [13/Apr/2012:10:13:57 -0400] "GET /test2.php HTTP/1.1" 401 367 "-" "PycURL/7.21.6" req:"-" resp:"Digest realm=\"Restricted area\",qop=\"auth\",nonce=\"4f8834a527618\",opaque=\"cdce8a5c95a1427d74df7acbf41c9ce0\""
(pause for input here)
127.0.0.1 - - [13/Apr/2012:10:13:59 -0400] "GET /test2.php HTTP/1.1" 401 367 "-" "PycURL/7.21.6" req:"-" resp:"Digest realm=\"Restricted area\",qop=\"auth\",nonce=\"4f8834a7d6315\",opaque=\"cdce8a5c95a1427d74df7acbf41c9ce0\""
127.0.0.1 - - [13/Apr/2012:10:13:59 -0400] "GET /test2.php HTTP/1.1" 200 220 "-" "PycURL/7.21.6" req:"Digest username=\"admin\", realm=\"Restricted area\", nonce=\"4f8834a7d6315\", uri=\"/test2.php\", cnonce=\"NTM0Mjg4\", nc=00000001, qop=\"auth\", response=\"b6efc44cb2390ca8be1e70c8d7964719\", opaque=\"cdce8a5c95a1427d74df7acbf41c9ce0\"" resp:"-"

And this is the output of the script:

Header: HTTP/1.1 401 Unauthorized
Header: Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2012 14:13:57 GMT
Header: Server: Apache/2.2.20 (Ubuntu)
Header: X-Powered-By: PHP/5.3.6-13ubuntu3.6
Header: WWW-Authenticate: Digest realm="Restricted area",qop="auth",nonce="4f8834a527618",opaque="cdce8a5c95a1427d74df7acbf41c9ce0"
Hit enter to continue
Header2: HTTP/1.1 401 Unauthorized
Header2: Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2012 14:13:59 GMT
Header2: Server: Apache/2.2.20 (Ubuntu)
Header2: X-Powered-By: PHP/5.3.6-13ubuntu3.6
Header2: WWW-Authenticate: Digest realm="Restricted area",qop="auth",nonce="4f8834a7d6315",opaque="cdce8a5c95a1427d74df7acbf41c9ce0"
Header2: Vary: Accept-Encoding
Header2: Content-Length: 39
Header2: Content-Type: text/html
Header2:
Header2: HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Header2: Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2012 14:13:59 GMT
Header2: Server: Apache/2.2.20 (Ubuntu)
Header2: X-Powered-By: PHP/5.3.6-13ubuntu3.6
Header2: Vary: Accept-Encoding
Header2: Content-Length: 27
Header2: Content-Type: text/html
Header2:
Header: Vary: Accept-Encoding
Header: Content-Length: 39
Header: Content-Type: text/html
Header:

So clearly what's happening here is that when I call perform the second time, curl sends a second request without the Authorized header (to which my server sends another 401) followed by the request with Authorization (to which my server sends 200).

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks,
Joe

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Received on 2012-04-13