HTTP Cookies

reQ has built-in support for HTTP cookies; when a response is received with a Set-Cookie header, the relevant cookie will be stored in .cookie.jar, and then used automatically for future requests to the relevant host.

Expired cookies will be ignored, although currently the Max-Age attribute is not taken into account; this will be rectified in a future update.

It's also possible to use the .req.addcookie function, as demonstrated in the Advent of Code example.

Setting cookies

q).req.get["http://httpbin.org/cookies/set?abc=123&def=456";()!()];
-- REQUEST --
GET /cookies/set?abc=123&def=456 HTTP/1.1
Host: httpbin.org
Connection: Close
User-Agent: kdb+/3.5
Accept: */*


-- RESPONSE --
HTTP/1.1 302 FOUND
Connection: close
Server: gunicorn/19.8.1
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2018 22:49:15 GMT
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Content-Length: 223
Location: /cookies
Set-Cookie: abc=123; Path=/
Set-Cookie: def=456; Path=/
Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true
Via: 1.1 vegur

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Final//EN">
<title>Redirecting...</title>
<h1>Redirecting...</h1>
<p>You should be redirected automatically to target URL: <a href="/cookies">/cookies</a>.  If not click the link.
-- REQUEST --
GET /cookies HTTP/1.1
Host: httpbin.org
Connection: Close
User-Agent: kdb+/3.5
Accept: */*
Cookie: abc=123; def=456


-- RESPONSE --
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Connection: close
Server: gunicorn/19.8.1
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2018 22:49:16 GMT
Content-Type: application/json
Content-Length: 38
Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true
Via: 1.1 vegur

{"cookies":{"abc":"123","def":"456"}}

q).cookie.jar
host          path name | val   expires maxage secure httponly samesite
------------------------| ---------------------------------------------
"httpbin.org" "/*" "abc"| "123"                0      0
"httpbin.org" "/*" "def"| "456"                0      0

Deleting cookies

Cookies can be deleted or overwritten in the normal fashion, and expired cookies will be ignored.

q).req.get["http://httpbin.org/cookies/delete?abc";()!()];
-- REQUEST --
GET /cookies/delete?abc HTTP/1.1
Host: httpbin.org
Connection: Close
User-Agent: kdb+/3.5
Accept: */*
Cookie: abc=123; def=456


-- RESPONSE --
HTTP/1.1 302 FOUND
Connection: close
Server: gunicorn/19.8.1
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2018 22:50:48 GMT
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Content-Length: 223
Location: /cookies
Set-Cookie: abc=; Expires=Thu, 01-Jan-1970 00:00:00 GMT; Max-Age=0; Path=/
Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true
Via: 1.1 vegur

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Final//EN">
<title>Redirecting...</title>
<h1>Redirecting...</h1>
<p>You should be redirected automatically to target URL: <a href="/cookies">/cookies</a>.  If not click the link.
-- REQUEST --
GET /cookies HTTP/1.1
Host: httpbin.org
Connection: Close
User-Agent: kdb+/3.5
Accept: */*
Cookie: def=456


-- RESPONSE --
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Connection: close
Server: gunicorn/19.8.1
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2018 22:50:48 GMT
Content-Type: application/json
Content-Length: 26
Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
Access-Control-Allow-Credentials: true
Via: 1.1 vegur

{"cookies":{"def":"456"}}

q).cookie.jar
host          path name | val   expires                 maxage secure httponl..
------------------------| ---------------------------------------------------..
"httpbin.org" "/*" "abc"| ""    1970.01.01T00:00:00.000 0      0      0      ..
"httpbin.org" "/*" "def"| "456"                                0      0      ..

reQ has support for reading & writing the cookie jar in the format initially developed by Netscape and utilised in cURL. See https://curl.haxx.se/docs/http-cookies.html for more details on the format. This support allows for transition from a cURL based workflow.

Read cookie jar with .req.readjar:

jonny@kodiak ~/git/req (master) $ more tests/cookiejar 
# Netscape HTTP Cookie File
# https://curl.haxx.se/docs/http-cookies.html
# This file was generated by reQ! Edit at your own risk.

httpbin.org TRUE    /   FALSE   1143149359  abc 123
httpbin.org FALSE   /example    TRUE    0   def 123
jonny@kodiak ~/git/req (master) $ q
KDB+ 3.5 2018.04.25 Copyright (C) 1993-2018 Kx Systems
l64/ 4(16)core 7360MB jonny kodiak 127.0.1.1 EXPIRE 2019.05.21 jonathon.mcmurray@aquaq.co.uk KOD #4160315

q)\l req.q
q).req.readjar`:tests/cookiejar
host           path        secure expires                 name  val   httponly maxage samesite
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"*httpbin.org" "/*"        0      2006.03.23T21:29:19.000 "abc" "123" 0                       
"httpbin.org"  "/example*" 1                              "def" "123" 0

Write cookie jar with .req.writejar:

jonny@kodiak ~/git/req (master) $ q
KDB+ 3.5 2018.04.25 Copyright (C) 1993-2018 Kx Systems
l64/ 4(16)core 7360MB jonny kodiak 127.0.1.1 EXPIRE 2019.05.21 jonathon.mcmurray@aquaq.co.uk KOD #4160315

q)\l req.q
... // build up reQ cookiejar
q).cookie.jar
host           path        name | val   expires                 maxage secure httponly samesite
--------------------------------| -------------------------------------------------------------
"*httpbin.org" "/*"        "abc"| "123" 2006.03.23T21:29:19.000        0      0                
"httpbin.org"  "/example*" "def"| "123"                                1      0                
q).req.writejar[`:jar].cookie.jar
`:jar
q)\\
jonny@kodiak ~/git/req_bk (master) $ more jar
# Netscape HTTP Cookie File
# https://curl.haxx.se/docs/http-cookies.html
# This file was generated by reQ! Edit at your own risk.

httpbin.org TRUE    /   FALSE   1143149359  abc 123
httpbin.org FALSE   /example    TRUE    0   def 123