Make an http Server - Recommended books?

Question

I am interested in making a simple HTTP server in C to play with (of course I'm only expecting to learn more about how a server works and gain some knowledge from there). I saw some topics regarding the same question as well as providing code but that didnt help. Are there any books for what I'm looking for?

Answer 1

First, there are many HTTP server C code out there. At least, have a look into some of them.

There are also several libraries for adding HTTP server abilities to your software. I do like the onion library, but there are others (libmicrohttpd, Wt for C++, etc...).

You need to be fluent with

• advanced unix programming
• unix networking programming
• HTTP protocol
• The C10K problem
• FastCGI perhaps

I'm not sure it is worth the effort to re-implement a simple HTTP server. You probably won't do better than existing stuff in a reasonable time.

You might learn more by studying and improving existing code.

At last, your question is perhaps off-topic here. Did you consider asking on programmers's forum?

Actually, since HTTP is a complex protocol (above TCP/IP which is itself complex, implemented e.g. on operating systems like Posix or Linux which are complex), you won't be able to make a simple but standard compliant implementation (if you want it robust enough, which is required by HTTP specs). It has to be complex!

You definitely will learn a lot by implementing something simple. Just read a little bit about HTTP (e.g. wikipedia's page on HTTP, and start implementing some simple GET and HEAD requests); but you should have some knowledge about e.g. basic Linux network programming. However, you'll then implement only a subset of HTTP.