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HTTP

HTTP server

kdb+ has an in-built webserver capable of handling HTTP/HTTPS requests.

Listening port

When kdb+ is configured to listen on a port, it uses the same port as that serving kdb+ IPC and websocket connections.

SSL/TLS

HTTPS can be handled once kdb+ has been configured to use SSL/TLS.

Authentication / Authorization

Client requests can be authenticated/authorized using .z.ac. This allows kdb+ to be customized with a variety of mechanisms for securing HTTP requests e.g. LDAP, OAuth2, OpenID Connect, etc.

Request handling

HTTP request handling is customized by using the following callbacks:

  • .z.ph for HTTP GET
  • .z.pp for HTTP POST
  • .z.pm for HTTP OPTIONS/PATCH/PUT/DELETE

Default .z.ph handling

The default implementation of .z.ph displays all variables and views. For example, starting kdb+ listening on port (q -p 8080) and visiting http://localhost:8080 from a web browser on the same machine, displays all created variables/views).

Providing q code as a GET param causes it to be evaluated eg. http://localhost:8080?1+1 returns 2.

.h.HOME can be set to be the webserver root to serve files contained in the directory e.g. creating an HTML file index.html in directory /webserver/ and setting .h.HOME="/webserver" allows the file to be viewed via `http://localhost:8080/index.html'.

An example of customizing the default webserver can be found in simongarland/doth

Restricting HTTP queries

Keep-alive

Persistent connections to supported clients can be enabled via .h.ka

Compression

HTTP server supports gzip compression via Content-Encoding: gzip for responses to form?…-style requests. The response payload must be 2,000+ chars and the client must indicate support via Accept-Encoding: gzip in the HTTP header. (Since V4.0 2020.03.17.)

HTTP client

Creating HTTP requests

kdb+ has helper methods that provide functionality as described in the linked reference material:

  • .Q.hg for performing a HTTP GET, where a query string can be sent in the URL
  • .Q.hp for performing a HTTP POST, where data transmitted is sent in the request body

e.g. 

q)/ perform http post
q).Q.hp["http://httpbin.org/post";.h.ty`txt]"my data"
"{\n  \"args\": {}, \n  \"data\": \"my data\", \n  \"files\": {}, \n  \"form\": {}, \n  \"headers\": {\n    \"Accept-Encoding\": \"gzip\", \n    \"Content-Length\": \"7\", \n    \"Content-Type\": \"text/plain\", \n    \"Host\": \"httpbin.org\", \n    \"X-Amzn-Trace-Id\": \"Root=1-665711e1-19e62fef6b6e4d192a9a7096\"\n  }, \n  \"json\": null, \n  \"origin\": \"78.147.173.108\", \n  \"url\": \"http://httpbin.org/post\"\n}\n"
q)/ request gzipped data, which is unzipped & returned in json and formatted appropriately
q).j.k .Q.hg "http://httpbin.org/gzip"
gzipped| 1b
headers| `Accept-Encoding`Host`X-Amzn-Trace-Id!("gzip";"httpbin.org";"Root=1-665710aa-50bd49d724b532913348a62a")
method | "GET"
origin | "78.147.173.108"

In addition, kdb+ provides a low level HTTP request mechanism:

`:http://host:port "string to send as HTTP request"

which returns the HTTP response as a string.

An HTTP request generally consists of:

  • a request line (URL, method, protocol version), terminated by a carriage return and line feed,
  • zero or more header fields (field name, colon, field value), terminated by a carriage return and line feed
  • an empty line (consisting of a carriage return and a line feed)
  • an optional message body

e.g.

q)/ perform HTTP DELETE
q)`:http://httpbin.org "DELETE /anything HTTP/1.1\r\nConnection: close\r\nHost: httpbin.org\r\n\r\n"
"HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\ndate: Wed, 29 May 2024 12:23:54 GMT\r\ncontent-type: application/json\r\ncontent-length: 290\r\nconnection: close\r\nserver: gunicorn/19.9.0\r\naccess-control-allow-origin: *\r\naccess-control-allow-credentials: true\r\n\r\n{\n  \"args\": {},...
q)postdata:"hello"
q)/ perform HTTP POST (inc Content-length to denote the payload size)
q)`:http://httpbin.org "POST /anything HTTP/1.1\r\nConnection: close\r\nHost: httpbin.org\r\nContent-length: ",(string count postdata),"\r\n\r\n",postdata
"HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\ndate: Wed, 29 May 2024 13:08:41 GMT\r\ncontent-type: application/json\r\ncontent-length: 321\r\nconnection: close\r\nserver: gunicorn/19.9.0\r\naccess-control-allow-origin: *\r\naccess-control-allow-credentials: true\r\n\r\n{\n  \"args\": {}, \n  \"data\": \"hello\"...

An HTTP response typically consists of:

  • a status line (protocol version, status code, reason), terminated by a carriage return and line feed
  • zero or more header fields (field name, colon, field value), terminated by a carriage return and line feed
  • an empty line (consisting of a carriage return and a line feed)
  • an optional message body

e.g.

q)/ x will be complete HTTP response
q)x:`:http://httpbin.org "DELETE /delete HTTP/1.1\r\nConnection: close\r\nHost: httpbin.org\r\n\r\n"
q)/ seperate body from headers, get body
q)@["\r\n\r\n" vs x;1]
"{\n  \"args\": {}, \n  \"data\": \"\", \n  \"files\": {}, \n  \"form\": {}, \n  \"headers\": {\n    \"Host\": \"httpbin.org\", \n    \"X-Amzn-Trace-Id\": \"Root=1-66572924-7396cee34f268fcd406e94d5\"\n  }, \n  \"json\": null, \n  \"origin\": \"78.147.173.108\", \n  \"url\": \"http://httpbin.org/delete\"\n}\n"

If a server uses chunked transfer encoding, the response is constructed from the chunks prior to returning (since V3.3 2014.07.31).

HTTP

SSL/TLS

To use SSL/TLS, kdb+ should first be configured to use SSL/TLS. For any request requiring SSL/TLS, replace http with https.

HTTP/HTML markup

The .h namespace provides a range of markup and HTTP protocol formatting tools.

Q for Mortals §11.7.1 HTTP Connections