How to get(view) html source code of a website
In this article, I will be illustrating about getting html source code of any website. I have done this in PHP.
I created an html form for submitting the website url. After the url is submitted, the PHP code does all the magic to display full html source code of that particular website. The source code is displayed in a textarea.
$domain = $_POST['domain'];
$handle = fopen(“http://$domain”,”r”);
//$contents = stream_get_contents($handle);
$contents = ”;
while (!feof($handle)) {
$contents .= fread($handle, 8192);
}
fclose($handle);
At first the website url submitted through the html form is opened with fopen(). Then, using while loop, the $contents string variable is populated (concatenated) until the end of file is reached. Finally, the file/url pointer is closed with fclose().
You can also get all the contents without using loop. You can get it with the stream_get_contents() function. But this function is only supported by PHP 5+. stream_get_contents() operates on an already open stream resource and returns the remaining contents in a string. stream_get_contents() will not work in PHP versions lower than PHP 5. If you are using PHP versions lower than PHP 5, then better not use it.
Description of functions used:
fopen() opens the url. The mode used here (i.e. ‘r’) is read mode.
feof() tests for end-of-file on a file pointer. It returns true if the file pointer is at EOF; otherwise it returns false.
fread() reads up to length bytes from the file pointer referenced by handle. Reading stops when up to length bytes have been read, EOF (end of file) is reached, (for network streams) when a packet becomes available, or (after opening userspace stream) when 8192 bytes have been read whichever comes first.
fclose() closes an open file pointer.
Full source code:
<?php
if(isset($_POST['submit']))
{
$domain = $_POST['domain'];
$handle = fopen("http://$domain","r");
//$contents = stream_get_contents($handle);
$contents = '';
while (!feof($handle)) {
$contents .= fread($handle, 8192);
}
//var_dump($contents);
}</p>
?></p>
<html>
<head>
<title>HTML Source Code Viewer</title>
</head>
<body></p>
<h2>
HTML Source Code Viewer
</h2></p>
<form method="post" name="pageform" action="" onsubmit="return validate(this);"></p>
<table border="0" style="border-collapse: collapse" width="">
<tr>
<td width="" height="91" valign="top">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse" width="" class="tooltop" height="76"></p>
<tr>
<td>
<table border="0" style="border-collapse: collapse" width="" cellspacing="5">
<tr>
<td height="28" width="100"><font size="2"><b>View source of</b></font><b><font size="2">:
</font></b></td>
<td height="28" width="">
<font size="1">http://</font><input type="text" name="domain" size="26" value="<?=$_POST['domain']?>"></td>
<td height="28" width="">
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="View!" style="float: left"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="" height="21"> </td>
<td width="" colspan="2" height="21" valign="top"><font size="1">(eg. chapagain.com.np)</font></td></p>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<?php
if(isset($_POST['submit']))
{
?>
<tr>
<td>
<textarea rows="10" cols="60" name="code"><?=$contents?></textarea>
</td>
</tr>
<?php
}
?>
</table>
</form>
<script language="JavaScript">
function validate(theform) {
if (theform.domain.value == "") { alert("No Domain"); return false; }
return true;
}
</script>
</body>
</html>
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