manual_h2_client

manual_h2_client is a simple HTTP/2 client library which assembles the HTTP/2 frames manually.
The purpose of the library is to debug a HTTP/2 server.

Requirement

• C++17 or later
• CMake 3.13 or later
• OpenSSL 1.1.1g or later
• GoogleTest 1.10 or later (optional)
• clang-format 10.0.1 or later (optional)

Usage

How to build

Build only the library:

$ cmake -B build \
  -DOPENSSL_ROOT_DIR=/path/to/openssl \
  -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=ON
$ cmake --build build

The default configuration builds only the library.

Build with unit tests enabled:

$ cmake -B build \
  -DOPENSSL_ROOT_DIR=/path/to/openssl \
  -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=ON \
  -DBUILD_TESTING=ON
$ cmake --build build
$ ctest --test-dir build --output-on-failure

Build with sample executables enabled:

$ cmake -B build \
  -DOPENSSL_ROOT_DIR=/path/to/openssl \
  -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=ON \
  -DMH2C_BUILD_SAMPLE=ON
$ cmake --build build

If the required tools are installed, you can also run formatting:

$ cmake --build build --target format

How to use

See the sample code.
You can execute the sample code in the following command after building with -DMH2C_BUILD_SAMPLE=ON.

$ ./build/sample/h2_get/sample_h2_get \
  --host nghttp2.org \
  --path /httpbin/headers
$ ./build/sample/h2_post/sample_h2_post \
  --host nghttp2.org \
  --path /httpbin/post
$ ./build/sample/h2_post_chunked_data/sample_h2_post_chunked_data \
  --host nghttp2.org \
  --path /httpbin/post
$ ./build/sample/h2_custom_headers/sample_h2_custom_headers \
  --host nghttp2.org \
  --path /httpbin/headers
$ ./build/sample/h2_ping/sample_h2_ping \
  --host nghttp2.org
$ ./build/sample/h2_window_update/sample_h2_window_update \
  --host nghttp2.org \
  --path /httpbin/headers

Shared sample options:

• --host HOST: target host name (default: nghttp2.org)
• --port PORT: target port (default: 443)
• --authority AUTHORITY: :authority pseudo-header value (default: host)
• --path PATH: request path for request/response samples
• --insecure: disable TLS certificate verification for manual debugging
• --help: print usage

Sample smoke check

For a quick end-to-end sample validation, build sample_h2_get and run the smoke-check helper:

$ cmake -B build \
  -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=ON \
  -DMH2C_BUILD_SAMPLE=ON
$ cmake --build build --target sample_h2_get
$ ./sample/h2_get/smoke_check.sh

The helper executes sample_h2_get directly and prints the exact command before running it. You can override the target endpoint without changing the sample itself:

$ MH2C_SMOKE_HOST=example.com \
  MH2C_SMOKE_PATH=/ \
  ./sample/h2_get/smoke_check.sh

Available environment variables:

• MH2C_SMOKE_HOST
• MH2C_SMOKE_PORT
• MH2C_SMOKE_PATH
• MH2C_SMOKE_AUTHORITY
• MH2C_SMOKE_INSECURE=1
• MH2C_SAMPLE_H2_GET_BIN