How to parse a none standard HTTP response?

Question

I'm having a real hard time figuring out how to parse a none standard HTTP response.

The none standard response contains ICY 200 OK instead of HTTP 200 OK. Here is a sample URL that sends the none standard HTTP response.
http://50.117.121.162:80

Since Android 4.4 HttpURLConnection will no longer work with these none standard responses. I have tried using the HttpClient by Apache but it doesn't work because of the none standard HTTP response. I have then tried following the guide for adding a custom response parser, but Android doesn't seem have all the classes needed to do it.

I'm really struggling to figure out a solution. Possibly modify the none standard response before it is parsed by the HttpClient or the HttpURLConnection could work but I'm not sure if that is even possible...

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

There is another solution to this issue in Android 4.4 but it requires using Apache HttpClient. This is based on possibility of providing custom response parser into Apache Http engine that can change ICY 200 OK to HTTP/1.0 200 OK. This is based on general idea presented in:

http://hc.apache.org/httpcomponents-client-4.2.x/tutorial/html/advanced.html

I have successfully used following code.

public class IcyClientConnection extends DefaultClientConnection{

@Override
protected HttpMessageParser createResponseParser(SessionInputBuffer buffer,
        HttpResponseFactory responseFactory, HttpParams params) {

    return new IcyHttpResponseParser(
            buffer, 
            new BasicLineParser (), 
            responseFactory, 
            params);

}

}


public class IcyClientConnectionOperator extends DefaultClientConnectionOperator {

    public IcyClientConnectionOperator(SchemeRegistry schemes) {
        super(schemes);
    }

    @Override
    public OperatedClientConnection createConnection() {

        return new IcyClientConnection();
    }

}



public class IcyClientConnManager extends SingleClientConnManager  {


    public IcyClientConnManager(HttpParams params, SchemeRegistry schreg) {
        super(params, schreg);
    }

    @Override
    protected ClientConnectionOperator createConnectionOperator(
            SchemeRegistry schreg) {
        return new IcyClientConnectionOperator(schreg);
    }

}

Now you have to extend parser used by default and add code that will change wrong server replay to correct one. Normally code will block on hasProtocolVersion.

public class IcyHttpResponseParser extends DefaultResponseParser{

    private CharArrayBuffer icyLineBuf;

    private int icyMaxGarbageLines = 1000;
    private final HttpResponseFactory icyResponseFactory;




public IcyHttpResponseParser(SessionInputBuffer buffer, LineParser parser,
        HttpResponseFactory responseFactory, HttpParams params) {
    super(buffer, parser, responseFactory, params);

    this.icyLineBuf = new CharArrayBuffer(128);
    icyResponseFactory = responseFactory;
}

@Override
protected HttpMessage parseHead(SessionInputBuffer sessionBuffer)
        throws IOException, HttpException {
    int count = 0;
    ParserCursor cursor = null;
    do {
        // clear the buffer
        this.icyLineBuf.clear();
        final int i = sessionBuffer.readLine(this.icyLineBuf);

        //look for ICY and change to HTTP to provide compatibility with non standard shoutcast servers

        String tmp = icyLineBuf.substring(0, this.icyLineBuf.length());
        if(tmp.contains("ICY ")){
            tmp = tmp.replace("ICY", "HTTP/1.0");
        }
        //copy
        this.icyLineBuf = new CharArrayBuffer(128);
        System.arraycopy(tmp.toCharArray(), 0, icyLineBuf.buffer(), 0, tmp.length());
        icyLineBuf.setLength( tmp.length());


        if (i == -1 && count == 0) {
            // The server just dropped connection on us
            throw new NoHttpResponseException("The target server failed to respond");
        }
        cursor = new ParserCursor(0, this.icyLineBuf.length());
        if (lineParser.hasProtocolVersion(this.icyLineBuf, cursor)) {
            // Got one
            break;
        } else if (i == -1 || count >= this.icyMaxGarbageLines) {
            // Giving up
            throw new ProtocolException("The server failed to respond with a " +
                    "valid HTTP response");
        }
        //if (this.log.isDebugEnabled()) {
        //   this.log.debug("Garbage in response: " + this.lineBuf.toString());
       // }
        count++;
    } while(true);
    //create the status line from the status string
    final StatusLine statusline = lineParser.parseStatusLine(this.icyLineBuf, cursor);
    return this.icyResponseFactory.newHttpResponse(statusline, null);
}
}

---

Plug in HttpClient:

Scheme http = new Scheme("http", PlainSocketFactory.getSocketFactory(), 80);
Scheme ftp = new Scheme("ftp", PlainSocketFactory.getSocketFactory(), 21);

SchemeRegistry sr = new SchemeRegistry();
sr.register(http);
sr.register(ftp);

HttpClient httpClient = new DefaultHttpClient(new IcyClientConnManager(params, sr), params);

This is still being tested but initial results are promising.

Answer 2

After a lot of research for a small/lite http client library, I ran into this port of the apache httpclient for android. The library provided a complete support for http connections. Then I simply modified the source code, particularly the BasicLineParser to replace ICY with HTTP/1.0.

Answer 3

I had similar problem with KitKat and had a success with using two classes found here for http post. They are incredibly easy to use and you can modify the protocol params easily too.