Network Communication Toolkit for Windows Developers

HTTP Get, HTTP Post software component for Visual Basic .NET for Windows

ActiveSocket is a Network Communication component for Windows Developers. It runs on any 32 bit and 64 bit Windows Platform, incl. Windows 7, Windows 2008, Windows 2003, Windows 2000, Windows Vista and Windows XP.
It features many IP protocols, incl.: SSH (Secure Shell), RSH (Remote Shell), HTTP(s), FTP, ICMP Ping, NTP, SNMP v1/v2c (Get,GetNext,Set), SNMP MIB translation, SNMP Trap Sender, SNMP Trap Receiver, Telnet, DNS, TCP, UDP, IP-to-Country, Wake-On-LAN and more. Samples are included many popular development platforms, incl. Visual C# .NET, Visual Basic .NET, ASP .NET, Visual Basic, Visual C/C++, ASP, Java, Javascript, PHP, Borland Delphi, Borland C++ Builder, ColdFusion.

HTTP Get and HTTP Post can be well integrated into Visual Basic .NET environments. This document describes how the ActiveSocket Http object can be integrated into Visual Basic .NET projects.

The most important functions of the Http object are:

  • Connect - connect to the (remote) HTTP web server on port 80 or any alternate port; optionally, use proxy credentials to use a proxy server; optionally, specify a web account and password for password protected web sites
  • Disconnect - to diconnect after a connect call;
  • ReadData - read all data from a web page;
  • WriteData - write data to a web page.

Step 1: Download and install the ActiveSocket Toolkit

Download the the ActiveSocket Toolkit from the ActiveXperts Download Site and start the installation. The installation guides you through the installation process.

Step 2: Create a new Visual Basic .NET Project

Launch Microsoft Visual Studio (for instance 'Microsoft Visual Studio 2005') from the Start menu. Choose 'New' from the 'File' menu and click on 'Project'. In the 'New Project' dialog, select a Visual Studio template (for instance: 'Console Application'). Select a name for the application (for instance: 'DemoApp') and a name for the solution (for instance: 'DemoSolution'). Also, select the directory where you want to store the project (for instance: 'C:\MyProjects):

(Click on the picture to enlarge)

Step 3: Refer to the ActiveSocket Library and create the objects

Now that a new project has been created, you must add a reference to the ActiveSocket Toolkit in the project to be able to use the the ActiveSocket object. To do so, choose 'Add Reference...' from the 'Project' menu. In the 'Add Reference' dialog that pops up, select the 'COM' tab and select the 'ActiveSocket 2.4 Type Library' as shown in the following picture:

(Click on the picture to enlarge)

Click 'OK' to close the 'Add Reference' dialog.

On top of your code, type the following line to use the ActiveSocket namespace:

   Imports ASOCKETLib

In your Main function, declare and create the following object:

   Public m_objHttp As Http

   m_objHttp = New Http()