In the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), HTTP header fields contain the operating parameters of an HTTP request or response. With the request or response line (first line of message), they form the message header.
The header fields define various characteristics of the data transfer that is requested, or the data that is provided in the message body.
Header fields start with the field name, terminated with a colon character, followed by the field value. Field names and values may be any application-specific strings, but a core set of fields is standardized by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in RFC 2616 and other updates and extension documents (e.g. RFC 4229), and are commonly understood by all compliant protocol implementations.
Many parameters may be followed by a quality or 'q' value, giving a weight to use in content negotiation. The HTTP message header is separated from the message body by a blank line.
