1.6 URL Encoding

When the client sends data to a CGI program using the Content-type of application/x-www-form-urlencoded, certain special characters are encoded to eliminate ambiguity. Table 1.1 shows which characters are transformed and which are not transformed. For more information on URLs, see RFC 1738.

Table 1.1. Character Encoding

ASCII	Symbol	CGI Representation
< 32		Always encode with %xx where xx is the hexadecimal representation of the character
32		+ or %20
33	!	%21
34	"	%22
35	#	%23
36	$	%24
37	%	%25
38	&	%26
39	'	%27
40	(	%28
41	)	%29
42	*	*
43	+	%2B
44	,	%2C
45	-	-
46	.	.
47	/	%2F
48	0	0
49	1	1
50	2	2
51	3	3
52	4	4
53	5	5
54	6	6
55	7	7
56	8	8
57	9	9
58	:	%3A
59	;	%3B
60	<	%3C
61	=	%3D
62	>	%3E
63	?	%3F
64	@	%40
65	A	A
66	B	B
67	C	C
68	D	D
69	E	E
70	F	F
71	G	G
72	H	H
73	I	I
74	J	J
75	K	K
76	L	L
77	M	M
78	N	N
79	O	O
80	P	P
81	Q	Q
82	R	R
83	S	S
84	T	T
85	U	U
86	V	V
87	W	W
88	X	X
89	Y	Y
90	Z	Z
91	[	%5B
92	\	%5C
93	]	%5D
94	^	%5E
95	_	_
96	`	%60
97	a	a
98	b	b
99	c	c
100	d	d
101	e	e
102	f	f
103	g	g
104	h	h
105	i	i
106	j	j
107	k	k
108	l	l
109	m	m
110	n	n
111	o	o
112	p	p
113	q	q
114	r	r
115	s	s
116	t	t
117	u	u
118	v	v
119	w	w
120	x	x
121	y	y
122	z	z
123	{	%7B
124	|	%7C
125	}	%7D
126	~	%7E
127		%7F
> 127		Always encode with %xx where xx is the hexadecimal representation of the character

The remainder of this book presents an overview of how certain HTTP functionality is performed using the appropriate headers and status codes.