Python socket module. Connecting to an HTTP proxy then performing a GET request on an external resource

Question

To begin with, I understand there are other modules such as Requests that would be better suited and simpler to use, but I want to use the socket module to better understand

Answer 1

To make a HTTP request to a proxy open a connection to the proxy server and then send a HTTP-proxy request. This request is mostly the same as the normal HTTP request, but contains the absolute URL instead of the relative URL, e.g.

 > GET http://www.google.com HTTP/1.1
 > Host: www.google.com
 > ...

 < HTTP response

To make a HTTPS request open a tunnel using the CONNECT method and then proceed inside this tunnel normally, that is do the SSL handshake and then a normal non-proxy request inside the tunnel, e.g.

 > CONNECT www.google.com:443 HTTP/1.1
 >
 < .. read response to CONNECT request, must be 200 ...

 .. establish the TLS connection inside the tunnel

 > GET / HTTP/1.1
 > Host: www.google.com