:mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` --- Simple HTTP request handler

.. module:: SimpleHTTPServer
   :synopsis: This module provides a basic request handler for HTTP servers.

.. sectionauthor:: Moshe Zadka <moshez@zadka.site.co.il>

The :mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` module defines a single class, :class:`SimpleHTTPRequestHandler`, which is interface-compatible with :class:`BaseHTTPServer.BaseHTTPRequestHandler`.

The :mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` module defines the following class:

This class serves files from the current directory and below, directly mapping the directory structure to HTTP requests.

A lot of the work, such as parsing the request, is done by the base class :class:`BaseHTTPServer.BaseHTTPRequestHandler`. This class implements the :func:`do_GET` and :func:`do_HEAD` functions.

The following are defined as class-level attributes of :class:`SimpleHTTPRequestHandler`:

.. attribute:: server_version

This will be "SimpleHTTP/" + __version__, where __version__ is defined at the module level.

.. attribute:: extensions_map

   A dictionary mapping suffixes into MIME types. The default is
   signified by an empty string, and is considered to be
   ``application/octet-stream``. The mapping is used case-insensitively,
   and so should contain only lower-cased keys.

The :class:`SimpleHTTPRequestHandler` class defines the following methods:

.. method:: do_HEAD()

   This method serves the ``'HEAD'`` request type: it sends the headers it
   would send for the equivalent ``GET`` request. See the :meth:`do_GET`
   method for a more complete explanation of the possible headers.

.. method:: do_GET()

   The request is mapped to a local file by interpreting the request as a
   path relative to the current working directory.

   If the request was mapped to a directory, the directory is checked for a
   file named ``index.html`` or ``index.htm`` (in that order). If found, the
   file's contents are returned; otherwise a directory listing is generated
   by calling the :meth:`list_directory` method. This method uses
   :func:`os.listdir` to scan the directory, and returns a ``404`` error
   response if the :func:`listdir` fails.

   If the request was mapped to a file, it is opened and the contents are
   returned.  Any :exc:`IOError` exception in opening the requested file is
   mapped to a ``404``, ``'File not found'`` error. Otherwise, the content
   type is guessed by calling the :meth:`guess_type` method, which in turn
   uses the *extensions_map* variable.

   A ``'Content-type:'`` header with the guessed content type is output,
   followed by a ``'Content-Length:'`` header with the file's size and a
   ``'Last-Modified:'`` header with the file's modification time.

   Then follows a blank line signifying the end of the headers, and then the
   contents of the file are output. If the file's MIME type starts with
   ``text/`` the file is opened in text mode; otherwise binary mode is used.

   The :func:`test` function in the :mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` module is an
   example which creates a server using the :class:`SimpleHTTPRequestHandler`
   as the Handler.

   .. versionadded:: 2.5
      The ``'Last-Modified'`` header.

The :mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` module can be used in the following manner in order to set up a very basic web server serving files relative to the current directory.

import SimpleHTTPServer
import SocketServer

PORT = 8000

Handler = SimpleHTTPServer.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler

httpd = SocketServer.TCPServer(("", PORT), Handler)

print "serving at port", PORT
httpd.serve_forever()

The :mod:`SimpleHTTPServer` module can also be invoked directly using the :option:`-m` switch of the interpreter with a port number argument. Similar to the previous example, this serves the files relative to the current directory.

python -m SimpleHTTPServer 8000

.. seealso::

   Module :mod:`BaseHTTPServer`
      Base class implementation for Web server and request handler.