HTTP Developer’s Handbook

Summary

In general, most HTTP agents are more forgiving with regard to formatting standards than you might think. As mentioned in this chapter, line-termination characters, HTTP header capitalization, and date formats are all known to sometimes stray from proper format. Thus, Web agents that want to be capable of interoperating with the most number of other agents will follow the saying, “be strict in what you send and lenient in what you receive.” Stated differently, you should adhere perfectly to the specification but not expect everyone else to.

The following chapter introduces the media types used in HTTP and represents the final chapter on the HTTP definition.