How to cache Web API response?

Is there a web service API where you can pass in a URL and it returns the HTTP response code?

• Answer:

  You can do this in the language of your choice, rather than having to call a web service (a web service that calls a web service?). Here's an example in Python, using httplib: import httplib def get_http_status(host, path='/'): """Returns the status code of the given host and path by requesting HEAD from the host (there's a joke in there somewhere). In the event of a networking error, an httplib exception will be raised. """ connection = httplib.HTTPConnection(host) connection.request('HEAD', path) return connection.getresponse().status print get_http_status('www.quora.com') # Should print '200' print get_http_status('www.quora.com', '/does/not/exist') # Should print '404' You could write an equivalent in PHP, Ruby, or any language that has some form of HTTP library. If you're looking to do this for debugging purposes, take a look at something like HTTP Client (a nifty Mac application): http://ditchnet.org/httpclient/