Finding a redirect's URL

kbeen has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hi,

I have been cracking my head against a wall trying to get the URL that a user is supposed to be redirectted to after submiting data.
After the data is submited the next page should contain a redirect, as the site administrator assured me that the asp code is this:

Response.Redirect("display.asp?qid=XXXXXX")
[download]

I read that the default for following redirects from a POST query is off, and I have tried it with both POST and GET. However, I don't want the script to actually follow the redirect, just get that precious "qid" value for me.

Using the code below, I can't find the redirect in the header or in the content. Does anybody know what is going on, and how my browser can be redirected, but there is actually information sent that tells it where to redirect to? Is there someway that I am not seeing every last byte of response using below?

my $hdrs = new HTTP::Headers('Cookie' => $cookie);
my $linkinfo = qw(http://www.nottherealsite.com/login.asp?ui=kbeen&pw=
+pass);
my $ncontent = new HTTP::Request('POST', $linkinfo, $hdrs);
my $resp = $ua->request($content);
my $body = $resp->content;
my $string = $resp->as_string();
print $string;  # no redirect in here
print $body;    #none here either
[download]

Any advice is appreciated.
Thanks
Kbeen

Comment on Finding a redirect's URL Select or Download Code

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Finding a redirect's URL by wog (Curate) on Nov 23, 2001 at 22:25 UTC
LWP allows you to make a request without LWP following redirects, etc. with the `simple_request` method of LWP::UserAgent. For example: `my $request = HTTP::Request->new("GET", "http://cnn.com/europe"); my $response = $ua->simple_request($request); print $response->header("Location"), "\n"; # http://europe.cnn.com` [download] Also the HTTP::Response class has a `previous` method to get the previous response in a chain of responses (as occurs when LWP follows redirects): `my $request = HTTP::Request->new("GET", "http://cnn.com/europe"); my $response = $ua->request($request); print $response->previous->header("Location"), "\n"; # http://europe.cnn.com` [download]	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Finding a redirect's URL by tachyon (Chancellor) on Nov 23, 2001 at 22:06 UTC
`use CGI; my $q = new CGI; print $q->redirect("http://somesite.somewhere.com?my_query=JaPh"); # or roll it yourself print <<THIS Status: 302 Moved Location: http://blah.blah THIS` [download] cheers tachyon s&&rsenoyhcatreve&&&s&n.+t&"$'$`$\"$\&"&ee&&y&srve&&d&&print	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Finding a redirect's URL by staeryatz (Monk) on Nov 24, 2001 at 00:37 UTC
There is a simple yet effective way of using redirection, without the need for a module. Use it just as you'd do an http header. `# code to resolve what $url is going to be # ... # redirection print "Location: $url\n\n";` [download] 'Location' is a standard CGI header, just like 'Content-type' and you'd use them the same way: make it the first thing your CGI script prints out, and make 2 newlines afterwards. This code is tested and works (providing you fill in the blanks). I used it for an anti-leech download page found here.	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Finding a redirect's URL by kbeen (Sexton) on Nov 24, 2001 at 06:01 UTC
I think maybe my question was a little unclear... I do not want to MAKE a redirect, rather find out where a page is trying to redirect the user.. Also, I don't really want to be redirected, only to get the URL that I would be redirected to if I was using a browser. Wog's comment seems like something I should look into, however, my problem is that LWP does not seem to be following a redirect. In fact, there does not seem to be a redirect in that response at all. The browser does redirect, and the site's administrator showed me the little bit of ASP code that actually creates the redirect. Where could this redirect be hiding? Am I missing something with LWP that is keeping me from seeing this? Thanks, Kbeen	[reply]
Re: Re: Finding a redirect's URL by blakem (Monsignor) on Nov 24, 2001 at 09:57 UTC
LWP comes with a nifty stand alone program called GET. GET is a script that uses the LWP modules to fetch remote web pages. The following worked for me: `% GET -Sd http://www.slashdot.org GET http://www.slashdot.org --> 301 Moved Permanently GET http://slashdot.org/ --> 200 OK` [download] Which shows www.slashdot.org being redirected to slashdot.org. This works fine if you just want to run a few URLs by hand. If you want to automate this functionality in a script, you can always peek under the covers of GET and emulate what its doing. -Blake	[reply] [d/l]


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