Using the HttpWatch Extension

When HttpWatch is installed, it adds an extension into the selected browsers that can be used to record and view HTTP requests. The extension window can be opened by clicking on the HttpWatch icon (see Getting Started ).

The HttpWatch extension window consists of three sections:

Toolbar

The toolbar is displayed at the top of the window and contains buttons that are used to control HttpWatch. For more information see Toolbar Buttons.

Request Grid

This displays a scrollable list of HTTP requests that have been recorded by HttpWatch. For more information see Requests Grid.

Request View

Selecting an item in the requests grid causes the lower part of the HttpWatch window to display detailed information about that item. The size of this region can be adjust by dragging the horizontal line that separates it from the requests grid. For more information see Request View.

 

Recording HTTP requests with HttpWatch

The basic steps required to control logging are as follows:

1. In the browser open the HttpWatch window by clicking on the icon or by selecting it from the menu (See Getting Started).
2. By default HttpWatch will start recording when opened.  Otherwise Click the Record button to start recording HTTP requests.
3. Use the browser to interact with the web site you want to examine.
4. Individual requests can be viewed by selecting them in the request grid.
5. The log can be emptied using the Clear button or logging can be halted with the Stop button.

You can avoid logging certain types of requests by using the filter. For example, if you are only interested in the pages returned by a site and not the images you would do the following:

1. Open the Filter dialog by clicking on the Filter button.
2. Enable filtering by clicking on the Enable filtering check box
3. Control the type of HTTP request that is logged by clicking on the Content is: check box and clicking on the first check box marked text/html.

This will restrict HttpWatch to only recording HTTP requests that return HTML content. For more information see Using the Filter.

Saving the Log

The Save button in HttpWatch allows the log to be saved as a .hwl (HWL) file and loaded into HttpWatch Studio at a later date (See Save button ). The log can also be exported as an HAR or CSV file.