rhttp

A Minimal HTTP/1.1 Implementation from Scratch in Go

rhttp is a learning-oriented, practical implementation of the HTTP/1.1 protocol in Go. Instead of relying on Go's net/http package, this project is built directly on top of raw TCP connections, implementing the HTTP/1.1 protocol (RFC 9112) step by step.

With rhttp, you can:

• Understand how HTTP/1.1 works under the hood.
• Explore parsing of requests, building of responses, and routing.
• Easily build a custom HTTP server on top of it.

This project aims to provide both a working server and an educational foundation for anyone curious about how HTTP servers are built at the protocol level.

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Table of Contents

• Why rhttp

• Core Principles

• Features

• Install

• Quick Start

  • Start a Minimal Server
  • Parse a Request
  • Build a Response

• API Overview

• Design Notes

• Roadmap

• Contributing

• License

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Why rhttp

Unlike frameworks or toolkits, rhttp is about learning by doing. It’s an implementation of HTTP/1.1 over TCP, giving you full control of the connection lifecycle and the ability to see what really happens when a browser talks to a server.

This makes it great for:

• Developers who want to build an HTTP server from scratch.
• Students learning networking, protocols, and systems programming in Go.
• Experimenting with protocol extensions, research, or custom servers.

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Core Principles

1. Build from Scratch — Every part of HTTP/1.1 (parsing, responses, routing) is implemented manually on top of Go's net package.
2. Educational Value — The codebase emphasizes clarity, correctness, and mapping directly to RFC 9112.
3. Practical Server Building — While educational, rhttp is fully capable of powering simple HTTP servers.

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Features

• Raw TCP-based request parsing — Parses the request-line, headers, and body stream directly from the socket.
• Response builder — Write correct HTTP/1.1 responses to any io.Writer.
• Radix-tree router — Supports parameterized routes and efficient handler lookups.
• Helper functions — JSON and text responses with minimal boilerplate.
• Custom error types — For handling bad requests, not found, and other HTTP errors.

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Install

go get github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp

go get github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/request

go get github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/response

go get github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/httperrors

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Quick Start

Start a Minimal Server

package main

import (
	"log"

	"github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp"
	"github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/request"
	"github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/response"
)

func main() {
	// 1. Create a new server instance
	server := rhttp.New(":8080")

	// 2. Register a handler for the home page
	server.AddRoute("GET", "/", handleHomePage)

	// 3. Start the server.
	log.Println("Starting server on http://localhost:8080")
	if err := server.ListenAndServe(); err != nil {
		log.Fatalf("Failed to start server: %v", err)
	}
}

// handleHomePage is the handler for the "/" route.
func handleHomePage(req *request.Request) (*response.Response, error) {
	log.Printf("Serving request for target: %s", req.Target)
	return response.Text(200, "Welcome to the home page!")
}

Parse a Request

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "log"
    "strings"

    "github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/request"
)

func main() {
    raw := "GET /users/123 HTTP/1.1\r\n" +
        "Host: api.example.com\r\n" +
        "Accept: application/json\r\n\r\n"

    r := strings.NewReader(raw)

    req, err := request.Parse(r)
    if err != nil {
        log.Fatalf("parse error: %v", err)
    }
    defer req.Body.Close()

    fmt.Println("Method:", req.Method)
    fmt.Println("Target:", req.Target)
    fmt.Println("Host:", req.Headers.Get("Host"))
}

Build a Response

package main

import (
    "bytes"
    "log"

    "github.com/mohdrashid9678/rhttp/response"
)

func main() {
    data := map[string]string{"status": "ok", "user_id": "123"}
    resp := response.JSON(200, data)
    resp.Headers.Set("X-Custom-Header", "my-value")

    var buf bytes.Buffer
    if err := resp.Write(&buf); err != nil {
        log.Fatalf("write failed: %v", err)
    }

    log.Printf("raw response:\n%s", buf.String())
}

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API Overview

• request: Parse raw HTTP requests → Parse(io.Reader) (*Request, error)
• response: Build and write HTTP responses → Write(io.Writer) error
• router: Register routes and map them to handlers → parameterized routing supported
• httperrors: Predefined HTTP error helpers

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Roadmap

• Add middleware support (logging, authentication).
• Context support (context.Context) for cancellations and deadlines.
• Chunked transfer encoding.
• Persistent connections / keep-alive.
• Experimental HTTP/2 implementation.

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Contributing

Contributions are welcome — especially improvements to protocol correctness, examples, and documentation.

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License

MIT License — see LICENSE.