Testing if a URL is Valid

Question

I have many URLs want to create a program that will see if the URL can be connected to and loaded.

I was thinking I could try downloading the source, but if it isn't a site then it wont download it. Is there a more efficient way of doing this?

EDIT: I'm going to use a HttpURLConnection and was wondering what method is fastest.

HttpURLConnection connection = (HttpURLConnection)url.openConnection();
connection.setRequestMethod("POST");

Is post or get better, and why?

Possible duplicate to http://stackoverflow.com/q/3584210/2040040 — johnchen902, Jul 14 '13 at 01:48

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 14 '13 at 01:56

If you just want to check syntax, the URL's constructor will address it. If you want to check for connectivity:

HttpURLConnection connection = (HttpURLConnection)url.openConnection();
try {
    connection.setMethod("GET");
    connection.connect();
} catch (IOException e) {
try {
    connection.setMethod("POST");
    connection.connect();
} catch (IOException e) {
try {
    connection.setMethod("HEAD");
    connection.connect();
} catch (IOException e) { try {
    connection.setMethod("DELETE");
    connection.connect();
}}}} catch (IOException e) {
// failed
}

Testing if a URL is Valid

1 Answers1