The Rewrite feature allows you to automatically modify different elements of a Request. If you are familiar with Breakpoints, you can think of Rewrites as ‘automated Breakpoints’.
The Rewrite feature has a long list of other rules you can add to your Request. You can add rules to:
- add, edit or delete headers
- change the URL or path
- change a parameter/query string
This tutorial will show you how to use the Rewrite feature to automatically add a header each time a Request is made to a specific URL.
Prerequisites
- Download Charles
- Make sure you have setup the Charles Root certificate on your Mac before you proceed to the next step
Go to the OpenBank API Products’ endpoint
Open Chrome and go to NAB’s Products endpoint
You should now get an error about about a “Missing mandatory header” (the missing header is called ‘x-v’)
Enable SSL Proxying
In Charles, right click the OpenBank request and click the “Enable SSL Proxying” option
The Request(s) you want to modify must be decrypted before you can use the Rewrite feature with it
Reload the page on Chrome
Return to Charles where you should now get a 406 error. Request details should be displayed in plain text
Copy URL
Right click the Request and click the “Copy URL” option
Open Rewrite screen
Tools -> Rewrite -> tick the “Enable Rewrite” checkbox
Setup Rewrite – Location
Add -> Click Add (from the ‘Location’ section) -> Paste URL (copied from a previous step above) into “Host” field -> press the “tab” on your keyboard (this will auto populate most of the fields) -> set the “Port” to 443
This is a good article which explains what port 443 is all about
Setup Rewrite – Rule
Click Add (from the ‘Rule’ section) -> select “Add Header” from the “Type” dropdown -> in the “New” section add the following details:
- Name: x-v
- Value: 1
Finally, click the ‘OK’ button to save the Rule
Reload the page in Chrome
You should now see a list of Products
From now on Charles has will now automatically add the ‘x-v’ header every time you go to NAB’s Products endpoint
Details of Rewrite
If you return to Charles, you should see a 200 status code and a list of Products in the Response body.
If you click on ‘Overview’ you should see a section called ‘Notes’ which will list all Rewrite rules that have been applied to this Request
