Analysis of the main features and differences of different versions of HTTP

HTTP has many versions, and each version also has its own differences. This article is an overview and summary of the main features of HTTP different versions. I hope it can help everyone.

HTTP1.0

The earlier HTTP version of 1.0 is a stateless, connectionless application layer protocol.

HTTP1.0 stipulates that the browser and the server maintain a short-lived connection. Each request of the browser needs to establish a TCP connection with the server. After the server completes processing The TCP connection is immediately disconnected (no connection) and the server does not track each client nor log past requests (stateless).

This statelessness can be done with the help of the cookie/session mechanism for identity authentication and status recording. The following two questions are more troublesome.

First of all, the biggest performance flaw caused by the connectionless feature is the inability to reuse connections. Every time a request is sent, a TCP connection is required, and the TCP connection release process is more troublesome. This connectionless feature makes network utilization very low.

The second is head of line blocking (head of line blocking). Because HTTP1.0 stipulates that the next request must be sent before the response to the previous request arrives. Assuming that the response to the previous request never arrives, the next request will not be sent, and the same subsequent requests will also be blocked.

In order to solve these problems, HTTP1.1 appeared.

HTTP1.1

For HTTP1.1, it not only inherits the simple features of HTTP1.0, but also overcomes many HTTP1 .0Performance issues.

First is long connection, HTTP1.1 adds a Connection field, which can be set by setting Keep-Alive Keep the HTTP connection from being disconnected, avoiding the need to repeatedly establish, release and establish the TCP connection every time the client and server request, improving network utilization. If the client wants to close the HTTP connection, it can carry Connection: false in the request header to tell the server to close the request.

Secondly, HTTP1.1 supports request pipelining (pipelining). Long connections based on HTTP1.1 make request pipelines possible. Pipelining allows requests to be transmitted in parallel. For example, if the main body of the response is a html page, and the page contains a lot of img, then keep-alive will play a big role. The function is to be able to send multiple requests in parallel. (The client establishes a connection to the server based on the domain name. Generally, PC browsers will establish 6~8 connections to the server of a single domain name at the same time. Mobile terminals generally control 4~6 connections. . This is why many large websites set up different static resource CDN domain names to load resources)

It should be noted that the server must send back the corresponding results in the order requested by the client to ensure that. The client can distinguish the response content of each request.

In other words, HTTPPipeline allows us to migrate the first-in-first-out queue from the client (request queue) to the server (response queue).

As shown in the figure, the client sent two requests at the same time to obtain html and css, if the server's css resource is ready first, the server will also send html first and then css.

At the same time, pipeline technology only allows the client to send a set of requests to a server at the same time. If the client wants to initiate another set of requests to the same server, it must also wait for the previous set of requests. All responses completed.

It can be seen that HTTP1.1 solves the problem of head of line blocking (head of line blocking) is not yet complete. At the same time, there are various problems with "pipeline" technology, so many browsers either do not support it at all, or they simply turn it off by default, and the conditions for turning it on are very strict...

In addition, HTTP1.1 also adds caching processing (strong cache and negotiation cache [portal]), supports breakpoint transmission, and adds a Host field(Enables one server to be used to create multiple Web sites).

HTTP2.0

The new features of HTTP2.0 are roughly as follows:

Binary Framing

HTTP2.0By adding a binary framing layer between the application layer and the transport layer, it breaks through the performance limitations of HTTP1.1 and improves transmission performance.

It can be seen that although the specifications between the HTTP2.0 protocol and the HTTP1.x protocol are completely different, in fact HTTP2.0 has not changed The semantics of HTTP1.x.
Simply put, HTTP2.0 just replaces the header and body parts of the original HTTP1.x with frameJust re-encapsulated one layer.

Multiplexing (connection sharing)

The following are several concepts:

• Stream (stream ): Bidirectional byte stream on an established connection.

• Message: A complete series of data frames corresponding to the logical message.

• Frame (frame): HTTP2.0The smallest unit of communication. Each frame contains a frame header, which at least identifies the current The stream to which the frame belongs (stream id).

##As can be seen from the figure, all

HTTP2.0 communications are completed on one connection , this connection can carry any number of bidirectional data streams.

Each data stream is sent in the form of a message, and a message consists of one or more frames. These frames can be sent out of order and then reassembled based on the stream identifier (

stream id) in the header of each frame.

For example, each request is a data stream. The data stream is sent in the form of a message, and the message is divided into multiple frames. The header of the frame records

stream id for identification. Frames belonging to different data streams can be randomly mixed together in the connection. The receiver can re-attribute the frames to different requests based on stream id.

In addition, multiplexing (connection sharing) may cause critical requests to be blocked. Each data flow in

HTTP2.0 can set priority and dependencies. Data flows with high priority will be processed by the server first and returned to the client. Data flows can also depend on other sub-data flows.

Header compression

In

HTTP1.x, header metadata is sent in plain text and is usually added to each request 500~800 bytes of payload.

For example,

cookie, by default, the browser will attach cookie to header and send it to server. (Since cookie is relatively large and is sent repeatedly every time, information is generally not stored and is only used for status recording and identity authentication)

HTTP2.0Useencoder To reduce the size of header that needs to be transmitted, both communicating parties cache each have a header fields table, which avoids duplication of header 's transmission also reduces the size that needs to be transmitted. An efficient compression algorithm can greatly compress header, reduce the number of packets sent and thereby reduce latency.

Server Push

In addition to responding to the initial request, the server can push additional resources to the client without explicit request from the client.

Summary

HTTP1.0

##Stateless, no connection

HTTP1.1

Persistent Connection
Request Pipelining
Add caching processing
Add
• Host

  field, support breakpoint transmission, etc.

HTTP2.0

Binary Framing
Multiplexing (or connection sharing)
Header Compression
Server Push
Related recommendations:

About HTTP/2 Server Push

PHP implements HTTP authentication

Example analysis of how PHP implements simulated http requests

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