send a POST request from python that has both JSON and non-JSON data

Question

How would you send a request (from python) that ultimately ends up looking like this in the live header on the web page (http://localhost:8080):

POST /rest/marker/
json=%7B%22label%22%3A%22w%22%2C%22folderId%22%3Anull%2C%22url%22%3A%22%23FF0000%22%2C%22comments%22%3A%22%22%2C%22position%22%3A%7B%22lat%22%3A39.426912683948%2C%22lng%22%3A-120.20892536635%7D%7D&tid=0V7V

In better syntax, the POST request looks like this:

URL=http://localhost:8080/rest/marker/
json: {"label":"my label here","folderId":null, "url":"#FF0000","comments":"","position":{"lat":39.2965796259061,"lng":-120.16708374023438}}
tid: "0V7V"

(please ignore the data values, they are different in each of these tests)

I've tried several variations like the following:

a=requests.post("http://localhost:8080/rest/marker",data="json=%7B%22label%22%3A%22stuff%22%2C%22folderId%22%3Anull%2C%22url%22%3A%22%2300FF00%22%2C%22comments%22%3A%22%22%2C%22position%22%3A%7B%22lat%22%3A39.418%2C%22lng%22%3A-120.2%7D%7D&tid=0V7V")

a=requests.post("http://localhost:8080/rest/marker",json={"label":"stuff","folderId":"null","url":"#FF0000","comments":"","position":{"lat":39.4112,"lng":-120.2},"tid":"0V7V"})

a=requests.post("http://localhost:8080/rest/marker/",json={"label":"stuff","folderId":"null","url":"#FF0000","comments":"","position":{"lat":39.4112,"lng":-120.2}},data={"tid":"0V7V"})

The stacktrace I get in the response text always starts with this, which probably just indicates I'm doing it wrong:

java.lang.ClassCastException: net.sf.json.JSONNull cannot be cast to
net.sf.json.JSONObject

What's the right way to do this?

Answer 1

Try this:

import json

payload = {
    "label": "my label here",
    "folderId": None,  # converted to null by json serializer
    "url": "#FF0000",
    "comments":"",
    "position": {
        "lat":39.2965796259061,
        "lng":-120.16708374023438,
    }
}

response = requests.post(
    "http://localhost:8080/rest/marker",
    data={'json': json.dumps(payload), 'tid': '0V7V'}
)

From details in your question it sounds like the server expects you to post a form containing a field called json with a json-serialized string as its value.

When you send form data the values need to be urlencoded ...however requests will automatically do this for you. You just need to pass in a dict of your form data, though you will still have to json serialize the payload as the value of json key.

The problem with your first example is you have already urlencoded your payload, so when you pass it to requests it will end up double-encoded.

In your second example you are telling requests to send a json-serialized payload, just as a raw POST body rather than as form data.