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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-26T10:47:33+00:00

Now, first off, I want to understand whether or not its better to use

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Now, first off, I want to understand whether or not its better to use HttpWebRequest and Response or whether its better to simply use a webbrowser control. Most people seem to prefer to use the web browser, however whenever I ask people about it, they tell me that HttpWebRequest and Response is better. So, if this question could be avoided by switching to a web browser (and there’s a good reason as to why its better), please let me know!

Basically, I set up a test site, written in PHP, running on localhost. It consists of three files….

The first is index.php, which just contains a simple login form, all the session and everything is just me testing how sessions work, so its not very well written, like I said, its just for testing purposes:

<?php
session_start();
$_SESSION['id'] = 2233;
?>

<form method="post" action="login.php">
U: <input type="text" name="username" />
<br />
P: <input type="password" name="password" />
<br />
<input type="submit" value="Log In" />
</form>

Then, I have login.php (the action of the form), which looks like:

<?php
session_start();
$username = $_POST['username'];
$password = $_POST['password'];

if ($username == "username" && $password == "password" && $_SESSION['id'] == 2233)
{
    header('Location: loggedin.php');
    die();
}
else
{
    die('Incorrect login details');
}

?>

And lastly, loggedin.php just displays “Success!” (using the

element).

As you can see, a very simple test, and many of the things I have there are just for testing purposes.

So, then I go to my C# code. I created a method called “HttpPost”. It looks like:

private static string HttpPost(string url)
{
    request = HttpWebRequest.Create(url) as HttpWebRequest;
    request.CookieContainer = cookies;
    request.UserAgent = userAgent;
    request.KeepAlive = keepAlive;
    request.Method = "POST";

    response = request.GetResponse() as HttpWebResponse;

    if (response.StatusCode != HttpStatusCode.Found)
        throw new Exception("Website not found");

    StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream());
    return sr.ReadToEnd();
}

I built a Windows Form application, so in the button Click event, I want to add the code to call the HttpPost method with the appropriate URL. However, I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to put there to cause it to log in.

Can anyone help me out? I’d also appreciate some general pointers on programatically logging into websites!

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Have you considered using WebClient?

    It provides a set of abstract methods for use with web pages, including UploadValues, but I’m not sure if that would work for your purposes.

    Also, it’s probably better not to use WebBrowser as that’s a full blown web browser that can execute scripts and such; HttpWebRequest and WebClient are much more light weight.

    Edit : Login to website, via C#

    Check this answer out, I think this is exactly what you’re looking for.

    Relevant code snippet from above link :

    var client = new WebClient();
client.BaseAddress = @"https://www.site.com/any/base/url/";
var loginData = new NameValueCollection();
loginData.Add("login", "YourLogin");
loginData.Add("password", "YourPassword");
client.UploadValues("login.php", "POST", loginData);
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