Table of ContentsBasic FeaturesBasic ArchitectureHTTP VersionUniform Resource IdentifiersDate/Time FormatsCharacter SetsHTTP MessageHypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application-level protocol. HTTP is used for collaborative and distributed hypermedia information systems. It is the basis of data communication for the World Wide Web. HTTP is a generic, stateless protocol that can also be used for other purposes using extensions to its request methods, error codes, and headers. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get Original Essay HTTP is a communications protocol based on TCP/IP. HTTP is used to deliver data such as HTML and image files, query results, audio, videos, and other media files over the WWW. The default port number for HTTP is 80 but we can also use another port number. The development of HTTP was initiated by Tim Berners-Lee at CERN in 1989. The development of HTTP standards was coordinated by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the World Wide Web. Consortium (W3C), resulting in the publication of a series of requests for comments (RFC). The first definition of HTTP/1.1, the commonly used version of HTTP, occurred in RFC 2068 in 1997, although it was obsoleted by RFC 2616 in 1999, and then again by RFC 7230 and its family in 2014. A later version, the successor to HTTP/2.0, was standardized in 2015 and is now supported by major web servers. HTTP works as a request-response protocol in the client-server computing model. For example, a web browser may be the client and an application running on a computer hosting a website may be the server. The client sends an HTTP request message to the server. The server, which provides resources such as HTML files and other content, or performs other functions on behalf of the client, returns a response message to the client. The response contains information about the completion status of the request and may also contain the requested content in the message body. HTTP is designed to allow intermediary network elements to enhance or enable communications between clients and servers. HTTP is an application layer protocol designed as part of the Internet protocol suite. HTTP resources are identified and located on the network by uniform resource locators (URLs), using the http and https uniform resource identifier (URI) schemes. URIs and hyperlinks in HTML documents form interconnected hypertext documents. the server and waits for a response from the server. The server processes the request and reestablishes the connection with the client to return a response. HTTP is media independent: this means that data of any type can be sent over HTTP as long as the client and server know how to handle the content of the data. It is necessary for the client and server to specify the content type using the appropriate MIME type. HTTP is stateless: HTTP is connectionless and this is a direct result of HTTP being a stateless protocol. The server and the client only know each other during a request in progress. Then they both forget each other. Because of this nature of the protocol, neither the client nor the browser can maintain information between different requests to web pages.Basic ArchitectureThe following diagram shows a very basic architecture of a web application and illustrates where HTTP fits: HTTP protocol is a request/response protocol based on.