What to do when link requires cookies to function in app - ios

Question

So when I send request without any cookies I get an error.
when trying to get request manually (in a browser) I first need to go to homepage, which loads 4 cookies, then the request can proceed without error. Some experimenting showed that I need only one of the cookies.
This is completely new to me and any snippets/guides on how this can be implemented are welcome. I understand that this question Is pretty vague but I am lost in where to start looking and would appreciate any help
let url = URL(string: "homepage")
var request = URLRequest(url: url!)
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { data, response, error in
guard let data = data, error == nil, let httpResponse = response as? HTTPURLResponse, httpResponse.statusCode == 200 else {
print("response1")
print("error = \(error)")
print("response = \(response)")
return
}
if let json = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data) {
print("responseObject = \(json)")
} else {
print("response2")
print("responseString = \(String(data: data, encoding: .utf8))")
}
let url2 = URL(string: "requestpage")
var request = URLRequest(url: url2!)
request.setValue("application/json", forHTTPHeaderField: "Accept")
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { data, response, error in
guard let data = data, error == nil, let httpResponse = response as? HTTPURLResponse, httpResponse.statusCode == 200 else {
print("response2")
print("error = \(error)")
print("response = \(response)")
return
}
if let json = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data) {
print("responseObject = \(json)")
} else {
print("response2")
print("responseString = \(String(data: data, encoding: .utf8))")
}
}
task.resume()
}
task.resume()

Answer 1

In your code, you should:
initiate URLSessionTask for the landing page that sets the cookies;
that will, with no intervention on your part, will set the cookies in your URLSession;
after that response is successfully received, you can then send the next request and the cookies should be there automatically with no extra code.
Unless you did something to explicitly interfere with this process, URLSession seamlessly receives the the cookies and includes them in subsequent requests for you.
If you're scraping a web site (and if so, please check the ToS to make sure it's permitted), you are well advised to request the pages in the same order that a web browser would. It might feel like you could bypass that landing page and set the cookies yourself, but often the cookie values are generated dynamically and you can have problems if you try to bypass that landing page.
You asked for an example, and there's really not much to show. Just initiate second request from the completion of the first request. There's not a single reference to cookies in the Swift code. URLSession takes care of everything:
let url = baseURL.appendingPathComponent("setcookie.php")
var request = URLRequest(url: url)
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { data, response, error in
guard error == nil, let httpResponse = response as? HTTPURLResponse, httpResponse.statusCode == 200 else {
print("error = \(error)")
print("response = \(response)")
return
}
let url = baseURL.appendingPathComponent("results.php")
var request = URLRequest(url: url)
request.setValue("application/json", forHTTPHeaderField: "Accept")
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { data, response, error in
guard let data = data, error == nil, let httpResponse = response as? HTTPURLResponse, httpResponse.statusCode == 200 else {
print("error = \(error)")
print("response = \(response)")
return
}
if let json = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data) {
print("responseObject = \(json)")
} else {
print("responseString = \(String(data: data, encoding: .utf8))")
}
}
task.resume()
}
task.resume()
My first page, setcookie, just set a cookie:
<?php
setcookie("foo", "bar", time()+3600);
$result = array("success" => true);
echo json_encode($result);
?>
And my second page retrieved the cookies:
<?php
$result = array("success" => true);
if (isset($_COOKIE))
$result["_COOKIE"] = $_COOKIE;
header("Content-Type: application/json");
echo json_encode($result);
?>
And the above Swift code output:
responseObject = {
"_COOKIE" = {
foo = bar;
};
success = 1;
}