<httpWebRequest> Element (Network Settings)

Article
12/08/2006

Customizes Web request parameters.

<httpWebRequest
  maximumResponseHeadersLength="size"
  maximumErrorResponseLength="size"
  maximumUnauthorizedUploadLength="size"
  useUnsafeHeaderParsing="true|false"
/>

Attributes and Elements

The following sections describe attributes, child elements, and parent elements.

Attributes

Attribute	Description
maximumResponseHeadersLength	Specifies the maximum length of a response header, in kilobytes. The default is 64. A value of -1 indicates that no size limit will be imposed on the response headers.
maximumErrorResponseLength	Specifies the maximum length of an error response, in kilobytes. The default is 64. A value of -1 indicates that no size limit will be imposed on the error response.
maximumUnauthorizedUploadLength	Specifies the maximum length of an upload in response to an unauthorized error code, in bytes. The default is -1. A value of -1 indicates that no size limit will be imposed on the upload.
useUnsafeHeaderParsing	Specifies whether unsafe header parsing is enabled. The default value is false.

Child Elements

None.

Parent Elements

Element	Description
settings	Configures basic network options for the System.Net namespace.

Remarks

By default, the .NET Framework strictly enforces RFC 2616 for URI parsing. Some server responses may include control characters in prohibited fields, which will cause the System.Net.HttpWebRequest.GetResponse method to throw a WebException. If useUnsafeHeaderParsing is set to true, System.Net.HttpWebRequest.GetResponse will not throw in this case; however, your application will be vulnerable to several forms of URI parsing attacks. The best solution is to change the server so that the response does not include control characters.

Configuration Files

This element can be used in the application configuration file or the machine configuration file (Machine.config).

Example

The following code example shows how to specify a larger than normal maximum header length.

<configuration>
  <system.net>
    <settings>
      <httpWebRequest
        maximumResponseHeadersLength="128"
      />
    </settings>
  </system.net>
</configuration>

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