"http://http://http://@http://http://?http://#http://" is a legitimate URL | Hacker News Reader

" is a legitimate URL

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22 pointssohkamyung11 comments

This mostly makes sense except the 3rd and 5th `http://`, unless those are supposed to be grouped together?

    http:// (scheme)
    http:// (user)
    http:// ??
    @http:// (hostname)
    http:// ??
    ?http:// (parameter)
    #http:// (fragment)

Will buy a beer for the first person that demonstrates how to serve that URL.

Is it

    http:// (scheme)
    http: (user)
    //http:// (password)

at the start?

Yes, the username is "http" the password is "//http://"

The : separates the username and password (it's not part of either).

The url-path is "/http://?http://#http://" which can be further broken down into /abs_path, ?query and #fragment.

Edit: Also further correction to gp is that the hostname is "http" not "@http://".

The @ is the separator between username:password@hostname the : separates the port, which is omitted, and defaults to 80 for a http URI scheme and the first / separates the host:port portion from the path (which, in this case, happens to start with a /)

All you have to do is start a new country called Http, convince ICANN to adopt it as a new TLD (will need a lot of persuasion) and serve “http” as a dotless domain. But, you know, anything for a beer… (fyi: the host name is the part after @ and before the port number indicated by “:”)

Well first let's parse it.

  Welcome to Node.js v17.7.2.
  Type ".help" for more information.
  > u=new URL("http://http://http://@http://http://?http://#http://")                     
  URL {
    href: 'http://http//http://@http://http://?http://#http://',
    origin: 'http://http',
    protocol: 'http:',
    username: '',
    password: '',
    host: 'http',
    hostname: 'http',
    port: '',
    pathname: '//http://@http://http://',
    search: '?http://',
    searchParams: URLSearchParams { 'http://' => '' },
    hash: '#http://'
  }

Browsers give the same result, with uglier formatting.

As for serving a request:

  ~/a $ python3 -m http.server 80 &                                                          
  [1] 31173
  ~/a $ Serving HTTP on :: port 80 (http://[::]:80/) ...
  ~/a $ curl --resolve http:80:127.0.0.1 "http://http://http://@http://http://?http://#http://"
  ::ffff:127.0.0.1 - - [07/Sep/2022 02:15:53] code 404, message File not found            
  ::ffff:127.0.0.1 - - [07/Sep/2022 02:15:53] "GET //http://@http://http://?http:// HTTP/1.1" 404 -
  <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"                                               "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">                                        
  <html>
    <!-- snip -->
  </html>
  ~/a $

Reminiscent of the fact that "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo." is a grammatically correct sentence.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffal...

http (protocol)

:// (separator)

http (username)

: (separator)

//http:// (password)

@ (separator)

http (domain name)

: (separator)

//http: (port)

// (path)

?http:// (query string)

#http:// (fragment)

Is that it, the port looks a bit strange though ?

All I get is: This site can’t be reached

Valid URL != Someone serving that URL

It would be good if someone served that URL.

Wouldn't be possible on the open internet due to the hostname being "http" with no TLD. You could host it yourself on a network where you controlled the DNS however.

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