Httplistener and file upload

I think you are making things harder on yourself than necessary by doing this with an HttpListener rather than using the built in facilities of ASP.Net. But if you must do it this way here is some sample code. Note: 1) I’m assuming you’re using enctype="multipart/form-data" on your <form>. 2) This code is designed to be used with a form containing only your <input type="file" /> if you want to post other fields or multiple files you’ll have to change the code. 3) This is meant to be a proof of concept/example, it may have bugs, and is not particularly flexible.

static void Main(string[] args)
{
    HttpListener listener = new HttpListener();
    listener.Prefixes.Add("http://localhost:8080/ListenerTest/");
    listener.Start();

    HttpListenerContext context = listener.GetContext();

    SaveFile(context.Request.ContentEncoding, GetBoundary(context.Request.ContentType), context.Request.InputStream);

    context.Response.StatusCode = 200;
    context.Response.ContentType = "text/html";
    using (StreamWriter writer = new StreamWriter(context.Response.OutputStream, Encoding.UTF8))
        writer.WriteLine("File Uploaded");

    context.Response.Close();

    listener.Stop();

}

private static String GetBoundary(String ctype)
{
    return "--" + ctype.Split(';')[1].Split('=')[1];
}

private static void SaveFile(Encoding enc, String boundary, Stream input)
{
    Byte[] boundaryBytes = enc.GetBytes(boundary);
    Int32 boundaryLen = boundaryBytes.Length;

    using (FileStream output = new FileStream("data", FileMode.Create, FileAccess.Write))
    {
        Byte[] buffer = new Byte[1024];
        Int32 len = input.Read(buffer, 0, 1024);
        Int32 startPos = -1;

        // Find start boundary
        while (true)
        {
            if (len == 0)
            {
                throw new Exception("Start Boundaray Not Found");
            }

            startPos = IndexOf(buffer, len, boundaryBytes);
            if (startPos >= 0)
            {
                break;
            }
            else
            {
                Array.Copy(buffer, len - boundaryLen, buffer, 0, boundaryLen);
                len = input.Read(buffer, boundaryLen, 1024 - boundaryLen);
            }
        }

        // Skip four lines (Boundary, Content-Disposition, Content-Type, and a blank)
        for (Int32 i = 0; i < 4; i++)
        {
            while (true)
            {
                if (len == 0)
                {
                    throw new Exception("Preamble not Found.");
                }

                startPos = Array.IndexOf(buffer, enc.GetBytes("\n")[0], startPos);
                if (startPos >= 0)
                {
                    startPos++;
                    break;
                }
                else
                {
                    len = input.Read(buffer, 0, 1024);
                }
            }
        }

        Array.Copy(buffer, startPos, buffer, 0, len - startPos);
        len = len - startPos;

        while (true)
        {
            Int32 endPos = IndexOf(buffer, len, boundaryBytes);
            if (endPos >= 0)
            {
                if (endPos > 0) output.Write(buffer, 0, endPos-2);
                break;
            }
            else if (len <= boundaryLen)
            {
                throw new Exception("End Boundaray Not Found");
            }
            else
            {
                output.Write(buffer, 0, len - boundaryLen);
                Array.Copy(buffer, len - boundaryLen, buffer, 0, boundaryLen);
                len = input.Read(buffer, boundaryLen, 1024 - boundaryLen) + boundaryLen;
            }
        }
    }
}

private static Int32 IndexOf(Byte[] buffer, Int32 len, Byte[] boundaryBytes)
{
    for (Int32 i = 0; i <= len - boundaryBytes.Length; i++)
    {
        Boolean match = true;
        for (Int32 j = 0; j < boundaryBytes.Length && match; j++)
        {
            match = buffer[i + j] == boundaryBytes[j];
        }

        if (match)
        {
            return i;
        }
    }

    return -1;
}

To help you better understand what the code above is doing, here is what the body of the HTTP POST looks like:

Content-Type: multipart/form-data; boundary=----WebKitFormBoundary9lcB0OZVXSqZLbmv

------WebKitFormBoundary9lcB0OZVXSqZLbmv
Content-Disposition: form-data; name="my_file"; filename="Test.txt"
Content-Type: text/plain

Test
------WebKitFormBoundary9lcB0OZVXSqZLbmv--

I’ve left out the irrelevant headers. As you can see, you need to parse the body by scanning through to find the beginning and ending boundary sequences, and drop the sub headers that come before the content of your file. Unfortunately you cannot use StreamReader because of the potential for binary data. Also unfortunate is the fact that there is no per file Content-Length (the Content-Length header for the request specifies the total length of the body including boundaries, sub-headers, and spacing.