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Getting Started With GET Curl Commands

·3 mins
Getting Started

Getting Started With GET Curl Commands #

Introduction to curl #

A curl command is a tool used on the terminal to make network requests using various protocols. curl is designed to aid with the data transfer to and from a server without the need for a web browser. With curl ,you can upload or download files, send requests to API endpoints to simulate user interaction from the terminal using a supported protocol such as HTTPs, FTP, and more.

Explanation of GET requests

Webpages display content to the end-user by requesting for resources from the server.These requests are commonly made using a GET HTTP request, often accompanied by query parameters when necessary.

This guide shows you how to run GET requests using a curl commands on the terminal.

Prerequisites

  1. A Mac, Windows or Linux laptop
  2. Access to the terminal
  3. Have curl installed in your machine.

To verify that curl is installed by run the command curl --version on the terminal. If properly installed, it will output the curl version installed.

Sending GET Requests with Curl #

The GET command in curl is used to perform a GET request to the specified URL and retrieve user content from the server. The basic syntax for GET commands is as follows: curl [OPTIONS] [URL] [OPTIONS] - curl parameters such as -o to specify where to save the output.

[URL] - specify the URL or sequence of URLs you want to make a request to.

The curl request below performa a GET HTTTP request and fetches the content on the specified URL then prints the response body on the terminal

curl https://documentwrite.dev/

Usage #

Downloading an image using curl

To download this image, https://documentwrite.dev/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/document-write-logo.png, using curl, you will follow the following steps on your terminal:

  1. Open the terminal or command prompt.
  2. Navigate to the path you want to save the image. In this case the pictures directory using the command cd pictures
  3. Run the following command to command to download the image:
curl -o logo.png https://documentwrite.dev/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/document-write-logo.png

The command above does the following: -o logo.png ****specifies the name of the file where to save the output of the response.

https://documentwrite.dev/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/document-write-logo.png is the url of the logo you want to download.

Check that the image file is downloaded successfully to the pictures folder.

Conclusion #

In this guide, we learned about curl and how to use the GET curl command to download an image from a URL. Curl is a powerful tool that can be used for various data transfer tasks, and its simplicity makes it accessible even to non-coders.

Remember to adjust the command and URL according to your specific use case.

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