Using NSURLSession for HTTP requests

fetch_nsurlsession.swift

    func funkytown() {
        let request = NSMutableURLRequest(URL: NSURL(string: "http://www.cnn.com")!)

        //request.HTTPMethod = "POST"
        //let postString = "id=13&name=Jack"
        //request.HTTPBody = postString.dataUsingEncoding(NSUTF8StringEncoding)
        request.HTTPMethod = "GET"
        
        let task = NSURLSession.sharedSession().dataTaskWithRequest(request) { data, response, error in
            guard error == nil && data != nil else {                                                          // check for fundamental networking error
                print("error=\(error)")
                return
            }
            
            if let httpStatus = response as? NSHTTPURLResponse where httpStatus.statusCode != 200 {           // check for http errors
                print("statusCode should be 200, but is \(httpStatus.statusCode)")
                print("response = \(response)")
            }
            
            let responseString = NSString(data: data!, encoding: NSUTF8StringEncoding)
            print("responseString = \(responseString)")
        }
        task.resume()
    }

To run in the playground, the following code is needed:

import XCPlayground
XCPlaygroundPage.currentPage.needsIndefiniteExecution = true