Getting only response header from HTTP POST using cURL

Question

One can request only the headers using HTTP HEAD, as option `-I` in `curl(1)`. ``` $ curl -I / ``` Lengthy HTML response bodies are a pain to get in command-line, so I'd like to get only the header as feedback for my POST requests. However, HEAD and POST are two different methods. How do I get cURL to display only response headers to a POST request?

Accepted Answer

```
-D, --dump-header <file>
       Write the protocol headers to the specified file.

This  option  is handy to use when you want to store the headers
       that a HTTP site sends to you. Cookies from  the  headers  could
       then  be  read  in  a  second  curl  invocation by using the -b,
       --cookie option! The -c, --cookie-jar option is however a better
       way to store cookies.
```

and

```
-S, --show-error
       When used with -s, --silent, it makes curl show an error message if it fails.
```

from the man page. so

```
curl -sS -D - www.acooke.org -o /dev/null
```

follows redirects, dumps the headers to stdout and sends the data to /dev/null (that's a GET, not a POST, but you can do the same thing with a POST - just add whatever option you're already using for POSTing data)

note the `-` after the `-D` which indicates that the output "file" is stdout.

Getting only response header from HTTP POST using cURL

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