[FIXED] What are the advantages of using a GET request over a POST request?

Issue

Several of my ajax applications in the past have used GET request but now I'm starting to use POST request instead. POST requests seem to be slightly more secure and definitely more url friendly/pretty. Thus, i'm wondering if there is any reason why I should use GET request at all.

Solution

I generally set up the question as thus: Does anything important change after the request? (Logging and the like notwithstanding). If it does, it should be a POST request, if it doesn't, it should be a GET request.

I'm glad that you call POST requests "slightly" more secure, because that's pretty much what they are; it's trivial to fake a POST request by a user to a page. Making it a POST request, however, prevents web accelerators or reloads from re-triggering the action accidentally.

As AJAX, there is one more consideration: if you are returning JSON with callback support, be very careful not to put any sensitive data that you don't want other websites to be able to see in there. Wikipedia had a vulnerability along these lines where the user anti-CSRF token was revealed via their JSON API.

Answered By - Edward Z. Yang

Answer Checked By - Gilberto Lyons (PHPFixing Admin)