How do I view the HTTP response to an ActiveResource request?

Question

I am trying to debug an ActiveResource call that is not working.

What's the best way to view the HTTP response to the request ActiveResource is making?

Answer 1

Monkey patch the connection to enable Net::HTTP debug mode. See https://gist.github.com/591601 - I wrote it to solve precisely this problem. Adding this gist to your rails app will give you Net::HTTP.enable_debug! and Net::HTTP.disable_debug! that you can use to print debug info.

Net::HTTP debug mode is insecure and shouldn't be used in production, but is extremely informative for debugging.

Answer 2

Add a new file to config/initializers/ called 'debug_connection.rb' with the following content:

class ActiveResource::Connection
  # Creates new Net::HTTP instance for communication with
  # remote service and resources.
  def http
    http = Net::HTTP.new(@site.host, @site.port)
    http.use_ssl = @site.is_a?(URI::HTTPS)
    http.verify_mode = OpenSSL::SSL::VERIFY_NONE if http.use_ssl
    http.read_timeout = @timeout if @timeout
    # Here's the addition that allows you to see the output
    http.set_debug_output $stderr
    return http
  end
end

This will print the whole network traffic to $stderr.