HttpClient in Android

Introduction

This article explains how to post data using HttpClient in Android. Android Studio is used to create the sample.

HttpClient is used when you want to receive and send data from server over the internet. So for this you need to create a http client using HttpClient class. First you will create the object of Http client and the URL to the construtor of HttpPost class that post the data. Now create the data that you want to send to the server. Set the entity with the data and get the response by ing httppost to the constructor of HttpResponse that returns the response. Get the statusLine tht the send data is valid or not. If the status code returns by the getStatus() is 200 it means your data is send. 

Step 1

Create a project like this:

Step 2

Create a an XML file and write this

<RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"

    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"

    android:layout_width="match_parent"

    android:layout_height="match_parent"

    android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"

    android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"

    android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"

    android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"

    tools:context=".MainActivity">

 

    <TextView

        android:layout_width="wrap_content"

        android:layout_height="wrap_content"

        android:text="@string/hello_world" />

 

</RelativeLayout>

Step 3

Create a Java class file with the following:
 

package com.androidhttpclient;

 

import java.io.IOException;

import java.io.UnsupportedEncodingException;

import java.util.ArrayList;

import java.util.List;

import org.apache.http.HttpResponse;

import org.apache.http.NameValuePair;

import org.apache.http.StatusLine;

import org.apache.http.client.ClientProtocolException;

import org.apache.http.client.HttpClient;

import org.apache.http.client.entity.UrlEncodedFormEntity;

import org.apache.http.client.methods.HttpPost;

import org.apache.http.impl.client.DefaultHttpClient;

import org.apache.http.message.BasicNameValuePair;

 

import android.annotation.TargetApi;

import android.app.Activity;

import android.os.Build;

import android.os.Bundle;

import android.os.StrictMode;

import android.util.Log;

 

public class MainActivity extends Activity {

    @TargetApi(Build.VERSION_CODES.GINGERBREAD)

    @Override

    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {

        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);

        if (android.os.Build.VERSION.SDK_INT > 9) {

            StrictMode.ThreadPolicy policy = new StrictMode.ThreadPolicy.Builder().permitAll().build();

            StrictMode.setThreadPolicy(policy);

        }

        // Creating HTTP client

        HttpClient Client = new DefaultHttpClient();

        // Creating HTTP Post

        HttpPost Post = new HttpPost(

                "http://androidexample.com/media/webservice/httppost.php");

 

        Log.d("HTTPPSt",""+Post);

        // Building post parameters

        // key and value pair

        List<NameValuePair> nameValuePair = new ArrayList<NameValuePair>(2);

        nameValuePair.add(new BasicNameValuePair("name", "username"));

        nameValuePair.add(new BasicNameValuePair("word","8090509239"));

 

        // Url Encoding the POST parameters

        try {

            Post.setEntity(new UrlEncodedFormEntity(nameValuePair));

        } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {

            // writing error to Log

            e.printStackTrace();

        }

        // Making HTTP Request

        try {

            HttpResponse response = Client.execute(Post);

            StatusLine statusLine=response.getStatusLine();

            // writing response to log

            Log.d("Http Response:", response.toString());

            Log.d("statusline:", ""+statusLine);

 

        } catch (ClientProtocolException e) {

            // writing exception to log

            e.printStackTrace();

        } catch (IOException e) {

            // writing exception to log

            e.printStackTrace();

        }

    }

}

Step 4

Use the following for the Android manifest.xml file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"

    package="com.androidhttpclient"

    android:versionCode="1"

    android:versionName="1.0" >

    <uses-sdk

        android:minSdkVersion="7"

        android:targetSdkVersion="16" />

 

    <application

        android:allowBackup="true"

        android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"

        android:label="@string/app_name"

        android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >

        <activity

            android:name="com.androidhttpclient.MainActivity"

            android:label="@string/app_name" >

            <intent-filter>

                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />

 

                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />

            </intent-filter>

        </activity>

    </application>

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET"></uses-permission>

</manifest>

Step 5

The read response and statusline returned from the server-side: