Python Requests Tutorial: GET, POST, HTTPS, File Upload/Download, Timeout, Authentication, Session, Token, and Test Automation Framework

This guide demonstrates practical usage of the requests library for various HTTP operations and shows how to structure a Python‑based API test automation framework.

1. Send a GET request

#导包
import requests
#定义一个url
url = "http://xxxxxxx"
#传递参数
payload = "{\"head\":{\"accessToken\":\"\",\"lastnotice\":0,\"msgid\":\"\"},\"body\":{\"user_name\":\"super_admin\",\"password\":\"b50c34503a97e7d0d44c38f72d2e91ad\",\"role_type\":1}}"
headers = {
  'Content-Type': 'text/plain',
  'Cookie': 'akpsysessionid=bafc0ad457d5a99f3a4e53a1d4b32519'
}
#发送get请求
r = requests.get(url=url, headers=headers, data=payload)
print(r.text)
print(r.encoding)
print(r.text.encode('utf-8').decode('unicode_escape'))

2. Send a POST request

#导包
import requests
#定义一个url
url = "http://xxxxxxx"
#传递参数
payload = "{\"head\":{\"accessToken\":\"\",\"lastnotice\":0,\"msgid\":\"\"},\"body\":{\"user_name\":\"super_admin\",\"password\":\"b50c34503a97e7d0d44c38f72d2e91ad\",\"role_type\":1}}"
headers = {
  'Content-Type': 'text/plain',
  'Cookie': 'akpsysessionid=bafc0ad457d5a99f3a4e53a1d4b32519'
}
#发送post请求
r = requests.post(url=url, headers=headers, data=payload)
print(r.text)

3. Send an HTTPS request (ignore certificate verification)

import requests
url = 'https://www.ctrip.com/'
# ignore certificate
r = requests.post(url=url, verify=False)
print(r.text)
# use a certificate file
r = requests.post(url=url, verify='path/to/cert')
print(r.text)

4. File upload

import requests
file = {'filename': open('文件名称', 'rb')}
response = requests.post("网址", files=file)
print(response.text)

5. File download

# Small file download
import requests
r = requests.get("https://img.sitven.cn/Tencent_blog_detail.jpg")
with open("D:\a.jpg", "wb") as f:
    f.write(r.content)
# Large file download
import requests
def test_downloads(url, file):
    s = requests.session()
    r = s.get(url, stream=True, verify=False)
    with open(file, "wb") as f:
        for chunk in r.iter_content(chunk_size=512):
            f.write(chunk)
if __name__ == "__main__":
    url = "https://www.url.com/test/export"
    file = "D:\a.xlsx"
    test_downloads(url=url, file=file)

6. Request timeout handling

#导包
import requests
for i in range(0,10):
    try:
        url = "http://xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
        data = {"head":{...}, "body":{...}}
        # timeout set to 0.03 seconds
        r = requests.post(url=url, json=data, timeout=0.03)
        print(r.text)
        print(r.cookies)
    except:
        print('error')

7. Authentication and session usage

# Basic auth
import requests
url = 'http://192.168.1.1'
headers = {}
r = requests.get(url, auth=('admin','123456'), headers=headers, timeout=10)
print(r.text)
# Session
session = requests.session()
response = session.post(url, headers=req_header, data=form_data)
# Token example
import requests
url = "http://xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
json = {"head":{...}, "body":{...}}
r = requests.post(url=url, json=json)
print(r.text)
print(r.cookies)

8. Signature generation (WeChat Pay example)

# appid, mch_id, device_info, body, nonce_str defined
import hashlib
stringA = "appid=wxd930ea5d...&nonce_str=ibuaiVcKdpRxkhJA"
md = hashlib.md5()
md.update(stringA.encode())
AES = md.hexdigest().upper()
print(AES)

9. Automation framework structure

config: configuration files (Python packages)

common: shared utility methods

testdata: test data files (xls, txt, csv)

test_case: test case scripts

report: generated HTML/XML reports

run_case: test execution script

log: logging

9.1 Example config functions

def server_ip():
    # return different server addresses based on environment
    server_add = {
        'dev_ip': 'http://his.xxxxxxxxxxx.com',
        'sit_ip': 'http://his.xxxxxxxxxxxx.comm'
    }
    return server_add['dev_ip']

def sql_conf():
    host = 'localhost'
    user = 'root'
    password = '123456'
    database = 'mysql'
    port = 3306
    charset = 'utf8'
    return host, user, password, database, port, charset

9.2 Common utilities (Excel reading, MySQL query)

# Read Excel
import xlrd
def get_excel_value(i):
    filename = r"../testdata/jiekou.xls"
    book = xlrd.open_workbook(filename)
    sheet = book.sheet_by_index(0)
    return sheet.cell_value(i,1), sheet.cell_value(i,2)
# MySQL query
import pymysql
from config.sql_conf import *
def get_sql(sql):
    host, user, password, database, port, charset = sql_conf()
    db = pymysql.connect(host=host, user=user, password=password, database=database, port=port, charset=charset)
    cursor = db.cursor()
    cursor.execute(sql)
    data = cursor.fetchall()
    cursor.close()
    db.close()
    return data

9.3 Sample test case

def test_aokao_login():
    url = server_ip() + '/service/user/login'
    username, password = get_excel_value(1)
    json = {
        "head": {"accessToken":"", "lastnotice":0, "msgid":""},
        "body": {"username": username, "password": password, "forceLogin":0}
    }
    r = requests.post(url=url, json=json)
    print(r.text)
    assert r.status_code == 200
    assert '"accessToken":"89a08bff-15d7-4d7a-9967-0b5f4fb699ce",' in r.text

def test_aokao_registadd():
    url = server_ip() + '/service/registration/registadd'
    data = {"head":{...}, "body":{...}}
    r = requests.post(url=url, json=data, timeout=0.09)
    print(r.text)
    print(r.cookies)
    assert r.status_code == 200

9.4 Test execution script

import pytest
if __name__ == "__main__":
    pytest.main([
        '../test_case/',
        '--html=../report/report.html',
        '--junitxml=../report/report.xml'
    ])

The article concludes with references to the original tutorial and illustrative diagrams.