gistfile1.java

package com.simplehttp;

import java.net.URI;
import java.net.URISyntaxException;
import org.apache.http.HttpResponse;
import org.apache.http.client.methods.HttpGet;
import org.apache.http.impl.client.DefaultHttpClient;
import org.apache.http.protocol.BasicHttpContext;
import org.apache.http.protocol.HttpContext;
import org.apache.http.util.EntityUtils;

public class OpenURI {
	public final static String USER_AGENT = "My simple user URI opener user agent";

	public static String openURI(URI uri, HttpContext httpContext) {
		HttpGet httpGet = new HttpGet(uri);
		DefaultHttpClient httpClient = new DefaultHttpClient();

		try {
			httpGet.addHeader("User-Agent", USER_AGENT);
			HttpResponse response = httpClient.execute(httpGet, httpContext);
			
			return EntityUtils.toString(response.getEntity());
		} catch (Exception e) {
			return null;
		}
	}

	public static String openURI(String uriString, HttpContext httpContext) {
		try {
			return openURI(new URI(uriString), httpContext);
		} catch (URISyntaxException e) {
			return null;
		}
	}

	public static String openURI(URI uri) {
		return openURI(uri, new BasicHttpContext());
	}

	public static String openURI(String uri) {
		return openURI(uri, new BasicHttpContext());
	}
}

// Usage:
import static com.simplehttp.OpenURI.openURI;

// ...
String body = openURI(url);