package WWW::Curl;
use strict;
use warnings;
use XSLoader;
our $VERSION = '4.15';
XSLoader::load(__PACKAGE__, $VERSION);
END {
_global_cleanup();
}
1;
__END__
=head1 NAME
WWW::Curl - Perl extension interface for libcurl
=head1 SYNOPSIS
use WWW::Curl;
print $WWW::Curl::VERSION;
=head1 DESCRIPTION
WWW::Curl is a Perl extension interface for libcurl.
=head1 DOCUMENTATION
This module provides a Perl interface to libcurl. It is not intended to be a standalone module
and because of this, the main libcurl documentation should be consulted for API details at
L<http://curl.haxx.se>. The documentation you're reading right now only contains the Perl specific
details, some sample code and the differences between the C API and the Perl one.
=head1 WWW::Curl::Easy
The name might be confusing, it originates from libcurl. This is not an ::Easy module
in the sense normally used on CPAN.
Here is a small snippet of making a request with WWW::Curl::Easy.
use strict;
use warnings;
use WWW::Curl::Easy;
my $curl = WWW::Curl::Easy->new;
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_HEADER,1);
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_URL, 'http://example.com');
# A filehandle, reference to a scalar or reference to a typeglob can be used here.
my $response_body;
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_WRITEDATA,\$response_body);
# Starts the actual request
my $retcode = $curl->perform;
# Looking at the results...
if ($retcode == 0) {
print("Transfer went ok\n");
my $response_code = $curl->getinfo(CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
# judge result and next action based on $response_code
print("Received response: $response_body\n");
} else {
# Error code, type of error, error message
print("An error happened: $retcode ".$curl->strerror($retcode)." ".$curl->errbuf."\n");
}
See L<curl_easy_setopt(3)> for details of C<setopt()>.
=head1 WWW::Curl::Multi
use strict;
use warnings;
use WWW::Curl::Easy;
use WWW::Curl::Multi;
my %easy;
my $curl = WWW::Curl::Easy->new;
my $curl_id = '13'; # This should be a handle unique id.
$easy{$curl_id} = $curl;
my $active_handles = 0;
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_PRIVATE,$curl_id);
# do the usual configuration on the handle
...
my $curlm = WWW::Curl::Multi->new;
# Add some easy handles
$curlm->add_handle($curl);
$active_handles++;
while ($active_handles) {
my $active_transfers = $curlm->perform;
if ($active_transfers != $active_handles) {
while (my ($id,$return_value) = $curlm->info_read) {
if ($id) {
$active_handles--;
my $actual_easy_handle = $easy{$id};
# do the usual result/error checking routine here
...
# letting the curl handle get garbage collected, or we leak memory.
delete $easy{$id};
}
}
}
}
This interface is different than what the C API does. $curlm->perform is non-blocking and performs
requests in parallel. The method does a little work and then returns control, therefor it has to be called
periodically to get the job done. It's return value is the number of unfinished requests.
When the number of unfinished requests changes compared to the number of active handles, $curlm->info_read
should be checked for finished requests. It returns one handle and it's return value at a time, or an empty list
if there are no more finished requests. $curlm->info_read calls remove_handle on the given easy handle automatically,
internally. The easy handle will still remain available until it goes out of scope, this action just detaches it from
multi.
Please make sure that the easy handle does not get garbage collected until after the multi handle finishes processing it,
or bad things happen.
The multi handle does not need to be cleaned up, when it goes out of scope it calls the required cleanup methods
automatically.
It is possible to use $curlm->add_handle to add further requests to be processed after $curlm->perform has been called.
WWW::Curl::Multi doesn't care about the order. It is possible to process all requests for a multi handle and then add
a new batch of easy handles for processing.
=head1 WWW::Curl::Share
use WWW::CURL::Share;
my $curlsh = new WWW::Curl::Share;
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_SHARE, CURL_LOCK_DATA_COOKIE);
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_SHARE, CURL_LOCK_DATA_DNS);
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_SHARE, $curlsh);
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_UNSHARE, CURL_LOCK_DATA_COOKIE);
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_UNSHARE, CURL_LOCK_DATA_DNS);
WWW::Curl::Share is an extension to WWW::Curl::Easy which makes it possible
to use a single cookies/dns cache for several Easy handles.
It's usable methods are:
$curlsh = new WWW::Curl::Share
This method constructs a new WWW::Curl::Share object.
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_SHARE, $value );
Enables share for:
CURL_LOCK_DATA_COOKIE use single cookies database
CURL_LOCK_DATA_DNS use single DNS cache
$curlsh->setopt(CURLSHOPT_UNSHARE, $value );
Disable share for given $value (see CURLSHOPT_SHARE)
$curlsh->strerror( ErrNo )
This method returns a string describing the CURLSHcode error
code passed in the argument errornum.
This is how you enable sharing for a specific WWW::Curl::Easy handle:
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_SHARE, $curlsh)
Attach share object to WWW::Curl::Easy instance
=head1 WWW::Curl::Form
use WWW::Curl::Form;
my $curlf = WWW::Curl::Form->new;
$curlf->formaddfile($filename, 'attachment', "multipart/form-data");
$curlf->formadd("FIELDNAME", "VALUE");
$curl->setopt(CURLOPT_HTTPPOST, $curlf);
Its usable methods are:
$curlf = new WWW::Curl::Form
This method constructs a new WWW::Curl::Form object.
$curlf->formadd(FIELDNAME, VALUE)
This method adds a field with a given value, to the form that is being submitted.
$curlf->formaddfile(FILENAME, DESCRIPTION, TYPE)
This method will add a file to the form. The description is the name of the field
that you form expects the data to be submitted in.
=head1 COMPATIBILITY
=over
=item curl_easy_setopt
Most of the options should work, however some might not. Please send reports, tests and patches to fix
those.
=item curl_easy_escape
Not implemented. Since equivalent Perl code is easily produced, this method will only made
available for interface completeness, if ever.
=item curl_easy_init
Used only internally. The standard Perl way of initializing an object should be used,
C<< my $curl = WWW::Curl::Easy->new; >>.
=item curl_easy_cleanup
Used only internally. Curl object cleanup happens when the handle goes out of scope.
=item curl_easy_duphandle
Should be working for most cases, however do not change the value of options which accept
a list/arrayref value on a duped handle, otherwise memory leaks or crashes will happen.
This behaviour will be fixed in the future.
=item curl_easy_pause
Not implemented.
=item curl_easy_reset
Not implemented.
=item curl_easy_unescape
Not implemented. Trivial Perl replacements are available.
=item curl_escape
Not implemented and won't be as this method is considered deprecated.
=item curl_formadd
Seems to be working.
=item curl_formaddfile
Seems to be working.
=item curl_formfree
Used internally. Not exposed through the public API, as this call has no relevance
to Perl code.
=item curl_free
Used internally. Not exposed through the public API, as this call has no relevance
to Perl code.
=item curl_getdate
Not implemented. This function is easily replaced by Perl code and as such, most likely
it won't be implemented.
=item curl_global_cleanup
Only used internally, not exposed through the public API.
=item curl_global_init
Only used internally, not exposed through the public API.
=item curl_global_init_mem
Not implemented.
=item curl_global_cleanup
Only used internally and called automatically upon exit.
=item curl_slist_append
Only used internally, not exposed through the public API.
=item curl_slist_free_all
Only used internally, not exposed through the public API.
=item curl_unescape
Not implemented and won't be, as this method is considered deprecated.
=item curl_version
Seems to work.
=item curl_version_info
Not yet implemented.
=item curl_multi_*
Most methods are either not exposed through the WWW::Curl::Multi API or they behave differently
than it's C counterpart. Please see the section about WWW::Curl::Multi above.
=item curl_multi_fdset
This method returns three arrayrefs: the read, write and exception fds libcurl knows about.
In the case of no file descriptors in the given set, an empty array is returned.
=back
=head1 NUANCES
=head2 Header output for redirects
It might be surprising that if C<CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION> is set and header output was enabled, headers show up for all http responses.
The reasoning behind that and possible code adjustments are outlined here: L<https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=61569>.
=head2 CURLOPT_PRIVATE
Despite what the libcurl manual says, in Perl land, only string values are suitable for this option.
=head1 ADDITIONAL METHODS
=head2 On WWW::Curl::Easy objects
=over
=item pushopt
Like C<setopt> but instead of overriding any previously set values it adds it
to the end. Can be used with C<CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER>, C<CURLOPT_QUOTE> and
C<CURLOPT_POSTQUOTE>.
=back
=head1 USAGE CASES
WWW::Curl is a thin binding on top of libcurl, to make using libcurl possible from Perl land.
Because of this, the module is less like Perl and more like C in coding style.
There is a new module, L<http://search.cpan.org/perldoc?WWW::Curl::Simple>,
which wraps this module into a more Perlish and userfriendly package.
The standard Perl WWW module, LWP should probably be used in most cases to work with HTTP or FTP from Perl.
However, there are some cases where LWP doesn't perform well. One is speed and the other is parallelism.
WWW::Curl is much faster, uses much less CPU cycles and it's capable of non-blocking parallel requests.
In some cases, for example when building a web crawler, cpu usage and parallel downloads are
important considerations. It can be desirable to use WWW::Curl to do the heavy-lifting of
a large number of downloads and wrap the resulting data into a Perl-friendly structure by
HTTP::Response or use WWW::Curl::Simple to do that for you.
=head1 CHANGES
Version 4.01 - 4.07 adds several bugfixes and extends functionality coverage. See Changes file.
Version 4.00 added new documentation, the build system changed to Module::Install,
the test suite was rewritten to use Test::More, a new calling syntax for WWW::Curl::Multi
was added, memory leak and other bugfixes added, Perl 5.6 and libcurl 7.10.8 as minimum
requirements for this module were set.
Version 3.12 is a bugfix for a missing Share.pm.in file in the release.
Version 3.11 added WWW::Curl::Share.
Version 3.10 adds the WWW::Curl::Share interface by Anton Federov
and large file options after a contribution from Mark Hindley.
Version 3.02 adds some backwards compatibility for scripts still using
'WWW::Curl::easy' names.
Version 3.01 added some support for pre-multi versions of libcurl.
Version 3.00 adds WWW::Curl::Multi interface, and new module names
following perl conventions (WWW::Curl::Easy rather than WWW::Curl::easy),
by Sebastian Riedel <sri at cpan.org>.
Version 2.00 of WWW::Curl::easy is a renaming of the previous version
(named Curl::easy), to follow CPAN naming guidelines, by Cris Bailiff.
Versions 1.30, a (hopefully) threadable, object-oriented,
multiple-callback compatible version of Curl::easy was substantially
reworked from the previous Curl::easy release (1.21) by Cris Bailiff.
=head1 AUTHORS
Currently maintained by Cris Bailiff <c.bailiff+curl at devsecure.com> and
Balint Szilakszi <szbalint at cpan.org>.
Original Author Georg Horn <horn@koblenz-net.de>, with additional callback,
pod and test work by Cris Bailiff <c.bailiff+curl@devsecure.com> and
Forrest Cahoon <forrest.cahoon@merrillcorp.com>. Sebastian Riedel added ::Multi
and Anton Fedorov (datacompboy <at> mail.ru) added ::Share. Balint Szilakszi
repackaged the module into a more modern form.
=head1 COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2000-2005,2008-2010 Daniel Stenberg, Cris Bailiff,
Sebastian Riedel, Balint Szilakszi et al.
You may opt to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute and/or sell
copies of the Software, and permit persons to whom the Software is furnished
to do so, under the terms of the MPL or the MIT/X-derivate licenses. You may
pick one of these licenses.
=head1 SEE ALSO
L<http://curl.haxx.se>
L<http://search.cpan.org/perldoc?WWW::Curl::Simple>
L<libcurl(3)>
The development source code is also available: L<http://github.com/szbalint/WWW--Curl/tree/master>