Compiling the HTTPClient

Here a few common things you may encounter when you attempt to compile parts of the HTTPClient.

• JDK 1.1 or later required

  You need to compile the classes using JDK 1.1 or later; the classes will not compile under JDK 1.0.2.

• deprecation warnings

  These can be safely ignored. The two places where deprecated API's are used are:

  1. Cookie.java: the constructor 'new Date(...)' is used because I need a flexible date parser to handle all the (broken) date formats used out there. Note that java.text.SimpleDateFormat doesn't even begin to cut it because it's far too restrictive, and I don't feel like writing my own parser (i.e. subclass of java.text.DateFormat) right now.
  2. CookieModules.java: 'System.runFinalizersOnExit(...)' is deprecated as of JDK 1.2. However, I need it to save the cookies at exit time. JDK 1.3 has a better solution, but until everybody has switched to that I'm stuck.

• errors about XXX.java actually containing HTTPClient.XXX

  As with using the HTTPClient, all the sources must be in a directory called HTTPClient and the CLASSPATH must point to the directory which contains the HTTPClient directory (i.e. it must point to one level above the sources).

• errors of the form: .../HTTPClient/XXX.java: Class HTTPClient/XXX already defined in .../HTTPClient/XXX.java

  This happens in some versions of JDK 1.1.x and is a bug in the compiler. Either use a different version of JDK 1.1, to JDK 1.2, or create a separate source directory, move the sources into there, and compile the classes into the actual HTTPClient directory (using the -d <directory> option to javac).

• makefile

  A makefile is provided. However, it's set up for my Linux environment, so you'll need to tweak the definitions at the beginning appropriately. If you're using M$ then you'll probably need to change a number of things; however, the dependencies should be ok.

• Ant build files

  A couple folks have kindly provided build files for use with Jakarta-Ant: build_1.xml and build_2.xml. They are provided as is, and you will probably want to tweak them to suit your needs.