Help Centre › Building Processes
This article describes the RPA HTTP functionality to send an HTTP request.
For a full list of available functions, please read HTTP functions.
Description
The Send HTTP request function executes an HTTP request (GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS) and stores the full response including status code, headers, body, elapsed time, final URL, and cookies.
Setting it up
To use the Send HTTP request function, follow these instructions:
{{popups:rpas/add:action=api-request}}
Once on a process map:
- Navigate to the process where you would like to add the Send HTTP request function
- Click on the green button's drop-down (right side of the green button labelled "Process")
- On the menu that appears, click on the "+ Activity" item
- From here you can select the Send HTTP request option
- Click "Add" once you are done
Input parameters
| Parameter | Required | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | No | Text | default | The alias of a previously created session (from api-session) |
| Method | No | Select (GET / POST / PUT / PATCH / DELETE / HEAD / OPTIONS) | GET | The HTTP method to use |
| URL | Yes | Text | - | The request URL (appended to session base_url if set) |
| Headers | No | JSON | - | Additional headers for this request (merged with session headers) |
| Params | No | JSON | - | URL query parameters as key-value pairs |
| Body | No | JSON / Text | - | The request body |
| Body type | No | Select (json / form / multipart / raw / xml) | json | The encoding format for the request body |
| Files | No | JSON | - | Files to include in a multipart request |
| Timeout | No | Number | - | Request timeout in seconds (overrides session timeout) |
| Variable | No | Text | response | Variable name to store the response |
Output variables
| Variable | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| {response} | Object | The response object containing: status_code (integer), headers (dictionary), body (parsed JSON or string), elapsed (seconds), url (final URL after redirects), cookies (dictionary) |
Errors
| Error | Description |
|---|---|
| Connection failed | Unable to establish a connection to the server |
| Timeout | The request exceeded the configured timeout |
| HTTP error | The server returned an error status code (4xx or 5xx) |
Tips
- Use body_type=form for URL-encoded form data, body_type=json for JSON payloads
- Always check response.status_code to verify the request succeeded
- Use the params parameter for query strings instead of concatenating them into the URL
- Create a session first (api-session) to avoid repeating auth and headers