Unirest: Lightweight HTTP Request Client Libraries

UniRest

Unirest is a set of lightweight HTTP libraries available in multiple languages, built and maintained by the Mashape team.

Unirest.post("http://httpbin.org/post")
  .queryString("name", "Mark")
  .field("last", "Polo")
  .asJson()

Features

Make GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS requests
Both syncronous and asynchronous (non-blocking) requests
It supports form parameters, file uploads and custom body entities
Easily add route parameters without ugly string concatenations
Supports gzip
Supports Basic Authentication natively
Customizable timeout, concurrency levels and proxy settings
Customizable default headers for every request (DRY)
Customizable HttpClient and HttpAsyncClient implementation
Automatic JSON parsing into a native object for JSON responses
Customizable binding, with mapping from response body to java Object

Installing

Is easy as pie. Kidding. It’s about as easy as doing these little steps:

With Maven

You can use Maven by including the library:

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.mashape.unirest</groupId>
    <artifactId>unirest-java</artifactId>
    <version>1.4.7</version>
</dependency>

There are dependencies for Unirest-Java, these should be already installed, and they are as follows:

<dependency>
  <groupId>org.apache.httpcomponents</groupId>
  <artifactId>httpclient</artifactId>
  <version>4.3.6</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>org.apache.httpcomponents</groupId>
  <artifactId>httpasyncclient</artifactId>
  <version>4.0.2</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>org.apache.httpcomponents</groupId>
  <artifactId>httpmime</artifactId>
  <version>4.3.6</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>org.json</groupId>
  <artifactId>json</artifactId>
  <version>20140107</version>
</dependency>

If you would like to run tests, also add the following dependency along with the others:

<dependency>
  <groupId>junit</groupId>
  <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
  <version>4.11</version>
  <scope>test</scope>
</dependency>
<dependency>
  <groupId>commons-io</groupId>
  <artifactId>commons-io</artifactId>
  <version>2.4</version>
  <scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

Without Maven

Alternatively if you don’t use Maven, you can directly include the JAR file in the classpath:http://oss.sonatype.org/content/repositories/releases/com/mashape/unirest/unirest-java/1.4.7/unirest-java-1.4.7.jar

Don’t forget to also install the dependencies (org.json, httpclient 4.3.6, httpmime 4.3.6,httpasyncclient 4.0.2) in the classpath too.

There is also a way to generate a Unirest-Java JAR file that already includes the required dependencies, but you will need Maven to generate it. Follow the instructions at http://blog.mashape.com/post/69117323931/installing-unirest-java-with-the-maven-assembly-plugin

Creating Request

So you’re probably wondering how using Unirest makes creating requests in Java easier, here is a basic POST request that will explain everything:

HttpResponse<JsonNode> jsonResponse = Unirest.post("http://httpbin.org/post")
  .header("accept", "application/json")
  .queryString("apiKey", "123")
  .field("parameter", "value")
  .field("foo", "bar")
  .asJson();

Requests are made when as[Type]() is invoked, possible types include Json, Binary, String, Object.

If the request supports and it is of type HttpRequestWithBody, a body it can be passed along with.body(String|JsonNode|Object). For using .body(Object) some pre-configuration is needed (see below).

If you already have a map of parameters or do not wish to use seperate field methods for each one there is a.fields(Map<String, Object> fields) method that will serialize each key – value to form parameters on your request.

.headers(Map<String, String> headers) is also supported in replacement of multiple header methods.

Full Documentation @ unirest.io