proxy connection in alpha

[mmaisterrena]

Question:
Is there a way to set up a proxy connection in alpha

Problem:
I want to use the "a5_downloadfile" function but my internet connection is though a proxy so the function is not being able to connect to any external internet pages (outside intanet) eg.
a5_downloadfile("www.google.com", "c:\google.txt")

[jdrake]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

Check out: HTTP_GET_PAGE2()


Also there is API where you can access this info directly and use OLE for it to work with Alpha.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...(v=VS.85).aspx


I am having some trouble with this though, maybe someone can help me finish it.

'Create a Pointer for the WinHTTP object and then create the object
DIM objHTTP as P
objHTTP = ole.Create("WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1")

'Set your proxcy here, you can also set urls to bypass the proxy
'option 2 says to use this address as your proxy for this connection
'objHTTP.SetProxy(2,"192.168.10.1:8080","")

'open and request a url
objHTTP.Open("GET","http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf",.F.)
objHTTP.Send()

'Create a file
DIM file_pointer as P
file_pointer = file.create("D:\W-4.txt", FILE_RW_EXCLUSIVE)

'This is where the trouble is, "objHTTP.ResponseBody" is not a character, its a string of bytes
'I don't know how to write this to a file without screwing it up if it doesn't contain a character
DIM fileResponseBody as C = ""
fileResponseBody = objHTTP.ResponseBody
file_pointer.write(fileResponseBody)

'Clean everything up
'The WinHTTP object cleans itself up so you only have to delete the pointer
file_pointer.flush()
file_pointer.close()
delete objHTTP

[jdrake]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

I guess if I did a little more research before I posted I would have completed it.

I didn't know there was a .writeB() function to write a blob of data.

So here is the working code to download any file, use a proxy or even download multiple files at the same time asynchronously if you want.

I left out the error checking, but if you go to the msdn site listed in the previous post, you can see all the attributes you can check to see if everything went okay.

DIM myDownload as C = ""
DIM myFile as C = ""
myDownload = "http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf"
myFile = "D:\W-4.pdf"

'Create a Pointer for the WinHTTP object and then create the object
DIM objHTTP as P
objHTTP = ole.Create("WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1")

'Set your proxcy here, you can also set urls to bypass the proxy
'option 2 says to use this address as your proxy for this connection
'objHTTP.SetProxy(2,"192.168.10.1:8080","")

'open and request a url
objHTTP.Open("GET",myDownload,.F.)
objHTTP.Send()

'Create a file and write to it
DIM file_pointer as P
file_pointer = file.create(myFile, FILE_RW_EXCLUSIVE)
if file.exists(myFile)
	file_pointer.writeb(objHTTP.ResponseBody)
else
	'file not found
	ui_msg_box("Error","Could not create file on disk.")
end if

'Clean everything up
'The WinHTTP object cleans itself up so you only have to delete the pointer
file_pointer.flush()
file_pointer.close()
delete objHTTP

[mmaisterrena]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

thank you Jay ill try that and post my results

[mmaisterrena]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

http_get_page2 works great, since it takes IE settings It uses the proxy address that is defined on IE

Thank you very much

[jdrake]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

The problem I had with http_get_page2 is that you might not get all the data if there is a non-printable character in what your downloading.

For example: try ?HTTP_GET_PAGE2("www.google.com")

then try

DIM myDownload as C = ""
DIM myFile as C = ""
myDownload = "http://www.google.com/"
myFile = "D:\google.txt"

'Create a Pointer for the WinHTTP object and then create the object
DIM objHTTP as P
objHTTP = ole.Create("WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1")

'Set your proxcy here, you can also set urls to bypass the proxy
'option 2 says to use this address as your proxy for this connection
'objHTTP.SetProxy(2,"192.168.10.1:8080","")

'open and request a url
objHTTP.Open("GET",myDownload,.F.)
objHTTP.Send()

'Create a file and write to it
DIM file_pointer as P
file_pointer = file.create(myFile, FILE_RW_EXCLUSIVE)
if file.exists(myFile)
	file_pointer.writeb(objHTTP.ResponseBody)
else
	'file not found
	ui_msg_box("Error","Could not create file on disk.")
end if

'Clean everything up
'The WinHTTP object cleans itself up so you only have to delete the pointer
file_pointer.flush()
file_pointer.close()
delete objHTTP

You will see that a large piece of data is missing in HTTP_GET_PAGE2()

So be careful in that respect.

[jdrake]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

Internet Explorer stores it's proxy settings in the registry. Therefore, they can easily be read into this script.

This script use Internet Explorer's Proxy settings

DIM myDownload as C = ""
DIM myFile as C = ""
myDownload = "http://www.google.com"
myFile = "D:\google.txt"

'Create a Pointer for the WinHTTP object and then create the object
DIM objHTTP as P
objHTTP = ole.Create("WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1")

'Set your proxy here, you can also set urls to bypass the proxy
'option 2 says to use this address as your proxy for this connection
'This will lookup the Proxy settings from Internet Explorer
DIM proxyOn as C = ""
DIM proxyAddress as C = ""
DIM proxyBypassAddress as C = ""

proxyOn = registry.sys_get("HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ProxyEnable")
proxyAddress = stritran(word(registry.sys_get("HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ProxyServer"),1,";"),"http=")
proxyBypassAddress = registry.sys_get("HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ProxyOverride")

if proxyOn = "1" then
	objHTTP.SetProxy(2,proxyAddress,proxyBypassAddress)
else
	objHTTP.SetProxy(1)
end if

'open and request a url
objHTTP.Open("GET",myDownload,.F.)
objHTTP.Send()

'Create a file and write to it
DIM file_pointer as P
file_pointer = file.create(myFile, FILE_RW_EXCLUSIVE)
if file.exists(myFile)
	file_pointer.writeb(objHTTP.ResponseBody)
else
	'file not found
	ui_msg_box("Error","Could not create file on disk.")
end if

'Clean everything up
'The WinHTTP object cleans itself up so you only have to delete the pointer
file_pointer.flush()
file_pointer.close()
delete objHTTP

[csda1]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

Hi Jay,

The problem I had with http_get_page2 is that you might not get all the data if there is a non-printable character in what your downloading.

For example: try ?HTTP_GET_PAGE2("www.google.com")

Don't confuse the results in the interactive window with the return data. If the return has an ascii null (chr(0)) in it (which it doesn't), it will show the result as a hex dump. Otherwise, it will show it as ASCII, including non-printable characters typically shown as boxes. Also, the Interactive window has a length limit for the entire window, after which it will truncate the text. If instead, you use

Save_to_file(HTTP_GET_PAGE2("www.google.com"),"C:\google1.txt")

Check the results which I got 11k bytes and compare to your code's objHTTP.ResponseBody, which I got 7k for.

Alpha can return any string that does not have embedded ascii nulls in it, even with high order bits set and any length.

[jdrake]

Re: proxy connection in alpha

Hi Jay,



Don't confuse the results in the interactive window with the return data. If the return has an ascii null (chr(0)) in it (which it doesn't), it will show the result as a hex dump. Otherwise, it will show it as ASCII, including non-printable characters typically shown as boxes. Also, the Interactive window has a length limit for the entire window, after which it will truncate the text. If instead, you use

Save_to_file(HTTP_GET_PAGE2("www.google.com"),"C:\google1.txt")

Check the results which I got 11k bytes and compare to your code's objHTTP.ResponseBody, which I got 7k for.

Alpha can return any string that does not have embedded ascii nulls in it, even with high order bits set and any length.

How I originally came across it, I was trying to download a pdf and I couldn't get it to download through a proxy.

Try this:
Save_to_file(HTTP_GET_PAGE2("http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf"),"C:\test.pdf")

It gets all hung up around non-printable characters.