Java Doc for BasicHeaderElement.java in  » Net » httpcomponents-core-4.0-beta1 » org » apache » http » message » Java Source Code / Java DocumentationJava Source Code and Java Documentation

Some HTTP headers (such as the set-cookie header) have values that can be decomposed into multiple elements. Such headers must be in the following form:

 header  = [ element ] *( "," [ element ] )
 element = name [ "=" [ value ] ] *( ";" [ param ] )
 param   = name [ "=" [ value ] ]
 name    = token
 value   = ( token | quoted-string )
 token         = 1*<any char except "=", ",", ";", <"> and
 white space>
 quoted-string = <"> *( text | quoted-char ) <">
 text          = any char except <">
 quoted-char   = "\" char
 

Any amount of white space is allowed between any part of the header, element or param and is ignored. A missing value in any element or param will be stored as the empty String ; if the "=" is also missing null will be stored instead.

This class represents an individual header element, containing both a name/value pair (value may be null) and optionally a set of additional parameters.