EmbeddedHttp

Wrapper for HttpListener and basic Static Web Server

Minimal Usage

The following code segment provides a minimum usage scenario for EmbeddedHttp.

var server = new EmbeddedHttp.EmbeddedHttp(

    // Listen on localhost, port 8080, for URLs beginning with "/EmbeddedHttpConsole/"
    httpPrefixes: new List<Uri>()
    {
        new Uri("http://localhost:8080/EmbeddedHttpConsole/")
    },

    // Respond to specific routes
    routes: new List<IRoute>()
    {
        new Route("/data", context => new Response(ContentType.Text, "This is some data")) // Defaults to UTF8 Encoding
    },

    // Provide a static website from the directory specified below
    rootDirectory: Path.Combine(Environment.CurrentDirectory, "www"),

    // Optional: Provide a logging interface.
    logger: new Logger());

server.Start();

Notes on HttpPrefixes

The port specified in the HTTP prefix can be in use by multiple web servers. This is due to the fact that the Http.Sys Windows subsystem handles the initial connection and routes based on requested prefixes.

HttpListener operation comes with two restrictions.

1. URL Registration is required in the following circumstances:

   • Listening for connections outside of localhost.
   • Listening for connections on port 80.

   The following is an example URL registration command:

    netsh http add urlacl url=http://warhammer:8080/EmbeddedHttpConsole/ user=Everyone
   

   The command is similar for HTTPs URL registration:

    netsh http add urlacl url=https://warhammer:8080/EmbeddedHttpConsole/ user=Everyone
   

   NOTE: These commands must be run with elevated permissions.

2. HTTPS is only operational in the HttpPrefixes list when the server has a registered SSL certificate.

Static Websites

In the example above, the subdirectory www was used as the root directory of the static website. Note that the single registered HttpPrefix included a subdirectory /EmbeddedHttpConsole/. Because of URI local path mapping, requests to that subdirectory map to www\EmbeddedHttpConsole rather than directly to www as might be expected.

With HttpPrefixes that use only a root directory, such as http://localhost:8080/, along with the www root directory for the static website, the mapping is as expected. Requests to that HttpPrefix will serve up content from the www directory and its subdirectories.