Question

private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    string userName = textBox1.Text;
    string password = textBox2.Text;
    HttpWebRequest request = (HttpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create("http://www.youmint.com/LoginVerification.php?name="+userName+"&pass="+password+"&agreement=true&checkvalue=true");
    request.Method = "GET";
    request.KeepAlive = true;
    request.Headers.Add("Keep-Alive: 300");
    WebResponse response = request.GetResponse();
    Stream dataStream = response.GetResponseStream();
    StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(dataStream);
    string responseFromServer = reader.ReadToEnd();
    if (responseFromServer.Equals(""))
        MessageBox.Show("Successfully logged in!!");
    else if (responseFromServer.Equals("1"))
        MessageBox.Show("Login failed!");
    request = (HttpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create("http://www.youmint.com/FreeSms.html");
    response = request.GetResponse();
    dataStream = response.GetResponseStream();
    reader = new StreamReader(dataStream);
    responseFromServer = reader.ReadToEnd();
    /*secret code :P */
    reader.Close();
    dataStream.Close();
    response.Close();
 }

So, that’s my code… The first webrequest logs into the website. It works fine in the browser and returns 1 if the login is not correct. Then the second one is a normal webrequest to a webpage of the same website. But the login is already gone and the response I get is what I get if I’m not logged in! Can someone please tell me what I’m doing wrong? How do I keep it alive? Do I have to use an invisible webbroswer control or something like that?

Answer 1

@liho1eye is correct. Here’s some more info from the HttpWebRequest page:

For security reasons, cookies are
disabled by default. If you want to
use cookies, use the CookieContainer
property to enable cookies.

You’ll need to reference the HttpWebResponse.Cookies property to get the initial session token cookie.

Edit:

Here’s a quick and dirty sample of making a request to a page, and transferring response cookies to the next request. Didn’t do much testing or validation (so beware!) – just to give you the idea of the approach.

        //this only has login/password info, you may need other parameters to trigger the appropriate action:
        const string Parameters = "Login1$username=pfadmin&Login1$Password=password";

        System.Net.HttpWebRequest req = (HttpWebRequest)System.Net.WebRequest.Create("http://[WebApp]/Login.aspx");

        req.Method = "GET";
        req.CookieContainer = new CookieContainer();
        System.Net.HttpWebResponse resp = (HttpWebResponse)req.GetResponse();

        //Create POST request and transfer session cookies from initial request
        req = (HttpWebRequest)System.Net.WebRequest.Create("http://localhost/AdminWeb/Login.aspx");
        req.CookieContainer = new CookieContainer();
        foreach (Cookie c in resp.Cookies)
        {
            req.CookieContainer.Add(c);
        }
        req.ContentType = "application/x-www-form-urlencoded";
        //...continue on with your form POST