JavaScript does not allow request bodies with a GET request? about elasticsearch-definitive-guide HOT 8 CLOSED

Yes.

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

Clint, I thought this might be rather limitation of XMLHttpRequest object which is to my knowledge not part of JavaScript language specification but rather is provided in form of API in specific environments (such as web browsers).

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

Ah right, i see what you mean. That said, do you know of any implementations of javascript which do support GET with body?

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

IMO it is mixing of topics. JavaScript has nothing to do with GET. It is the web client or library that does the GET. May be there is a Node library that allows to do GET with body (I am not using it but may be Unirest allows that)? Or I can imagine calling Java API from JavaScript that would do it (so technically I would be using still JavaScript language and some API would allow me to do GET with body).

You can perfectly leave it as it is, I think many people will understand what you mean. It is that it just hit me into eyes ("... wait a sec. is this correct?"). But you know.. I might be oddball 😄

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

:)

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

Funny.
I looked into some Node http related libraries and surprisingly they often explicitly make sure they do not include body into request when doing GET. It is hardcoded into them, it is not by design of JavaScript language but rather practice. But is there actually any reason for this? I am afraid there might be one. The problem could be that HTTP RFC does not explicitly state how servers should treat GET requests with body. As a result some servers can simply reject GET requests with body.

curl -X GET 'http://google.com'
vs.
curl -X GET 'http://google.com' -d ' '
// using telnet it is even more interesting

If servers can do this so can proxy servers. And if this is really matter of server (or proxy) implementation why would only JavaScript HTTP clients be afraid of doing GET requests with body?

But in any case I think it might be valuable to elaborate this a little bit more in the book. I wouldn't be surprised if users of non-JavaScript clients would be hit by this as well (for example because these was very strict proxy in their way).

from elasticsearch-definitive-guide.

Yeah I agree we need to add some explanation. We often get people saying "you can't send a body with a GET" or that it is wrong. We should probably explain our justification for doing so, and the various workarounds available.

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Why not saying "Ajax calls don’t allow request bodies with a GET request."?

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