Usage of consumeContent() of HttpEntity

Question

What is the purpose of consumeContent() of class or org.apache.http.HttpEntity in Android?

When should one use it ane can it have side effects?

I\'m

Answer 1

As you can see in the javadoc, that method is deprecated. Don't use it. It's implementation-dependent. But it should be implemented as described:

This method is called to indicate that the content of this entity is no longer required. All entity implementations are expected to release all allocated resources as a result of this method invocation

Instead, you should be using EntityUtils.consume(HttpEntity) which is implemented as such

public static void consume(final HttpEntity entity) throws IOException {
    if (entity == null) {
        return;
    }
    if (entity.isStreaming()) {
        final InputStream instream = entity.getContent();
        if (instream != null) {
            instream.close();
        }
    }
} 

It's simply closing the underlying InputStream if necessary.