How to get the HTTP response body using chromedp? - google-chrome

Question

Using github.com/knq/chromedp, a go package to drive web browsers using Chrome Debugging Protocol, I can navigate to webpages, update forms and submit forms, but I need to retrieve a HTTP response body and haven't figured out how to yet. I'd like to be able to retrieve the HTTP response body for a JSON response (not HTML).
From looking in the code, it seems the HTTP response body is in the CachedResponse.Body property:
https://github.com/knq/chromedp/blob/b9e4c14157325be092c1c1137edbd584648d8c72/cdp/cachestorage/types.go#L30
And that it should be accessible using:
func (p *RequestCachedResponseParams) Do(ctxt context.Context, h cdp.Handler) (response *CachedResponse, err error)
https://github.com/knq/chromedp/blob/b9e4c14157325be092c1c1137edbd584648d8c72/cdp/cachestorage/cachestorage.go#L168
The examples use cdp.Tasks such as the following from the simple example.
func googleSearch(q, text string, site, res *string) cdp.Tasks {
var buf []byte
sel := fmt.Sprintf(`//a[text()[contains(., '%s')]]`, text)
return cdp.Tasks{
cdp.Navigate(`https://www.google.com`),
cdp.Sleep(2 * time.Second),
cdp.WaitVisible(`#hplogo`, cdp.ByID),
cdp.SendKeys(`#lst-ib`, q+"\n", cdp.ByID),
cdp.WaitVisible(`#res`, cdp.ByID),
cdp.Text(sel, res),
cdp.Click(sel),
cdp.Sleep(2 * time.Second),
cdp.WaitVisible(`#footer`, cdp.ByQuery),
cdp.WaitNotVisible(`div.v-middle > div.la-ball-clip-rotate`, cdp.ByQuery),
cdp.Location(site),
cdp.Screenshot(`#testimonials`, &buf, cdp.ByID),
cdp.ActionFunc(func(context.Context, cdptypes.Handler) error {
return ioutil.WriteFile("testimonials.png", buf, 0644)
}),
}
}
https://github.com/knq/chromedp/blob/b9e4c14157325be092c1c1137edbd584648d8c72/examples/simple/main.go
It seems like the CachedResponse.Body can be accessed by calling RequestCachedResponseParams.Do() by referencing RequestCachedResponseParams.CacheID, but the following is still needed::
how to call RequestCachedResponseParams.Do() in cdp.Tasks - seems possible using cdp.ActionFunc()
how to get access to RequestCachedResponseParams.CacheID

Answer 1

If you want to get request response, that's how I managed to do it.
This sample call http://www.google.com and listen EventResponseReceived to keep Response that contains Headers for example.
package main
import (
"context"
"io/ioutil"
"log"
"os"
"time"
"github.com/chromedp/cdproto/network"
"github.com/chromedp/chromedp"
)
func main() {
dir, err := ioutil.TempDir("", "chromedp-example")
if err != nil {
panic(err)
}
defer os.RemoveAll(dir)
opts := append(chromedp.DefaultExecAllocatorOptions[:],
chromedp.DisableGPU,
chromedp.NoDefaultBrowserCheck,
chromedp.Flag("headless", false),
chromedp.Flag("ignore-certificate-errors", true),
chromedp.Flag("window-size", "50,400"),
chromedp.UserDataDir(dir),
)
allocCtx, cancel := chromedp.NewExecAllocator(context.Background(), opts...)
defer cancel()
// also set up a custom logger
taskCtx, cancel := chromedp.NewContext(allocCtx, chromedp.WithLogf(log.Printf))
defer cancel()
// create a timeout
taskCtx, cancel = context.WithTimeout(taskCtx, 10*time.Second)
defer cancel()
// ensure that the browser process is started
if err := chromedp.Run(taskCtx); err != nil {
panic(err)
}
// listen network event
listenForNetworkEvent(taskCtx)
chromedp.Run(taskCtx,
network.Enable(),
chromedp.Navigate(`http://www.google.com`),
chromedp.WaitVisible(`body`, chromedp.BySearch),
)
}
func listenForNetworkEvent(ctx context.Context) {
chromedp.ListenTarget(ctx, func(ev interface{}) {
switch ev := ev.(type) {
case *network.EventResponseReceived:
resp := ev.Response
if len(resp.Headers) != 0 {
log.Printf("received headers: %s", resp.Headers)
}
}
// other needed network Event
})
}