python - What is the alternative of passing array to the URL?(URL too long)

Question

WHile requesting from GET method, The url is created like

<your_url>?paths=path1&paths=path2&paths=path3...

This can be very long if there are large number of paths.

I want to request the paths through the POST method because the request lines are too large in the url created by the GET method. Is there any alternatives for

request.GET.getlist('paths')

if the paths are very long, then it shows Bad Request, Request Line too large.

There is an alternative for this:

request.POST.getlist('paths')

What will be the equivalent way to pass the data in the query string in the template so that the url will not be very long and all files can be downloaded?

views.py

def test_download(request):
    paths = request.GET.getlist('paths')
    context ={'paths': paths}
    response = HttpResponse(content_type='application/zip')
    zip_file = zipfile.ZipFile(response, 'w')
    for filename in paths:
         zip_file.write(filename)
    zip_file.close()
    response['Content-Disposition'] = 'attachment; filename='+'converted files'
    return response

templates

<a href ="{% url 'test_download' %}?{% for path in paths %}paths={{ path|urlencode }}&{% endfor %}">Converted Files</a>

question from:https://stackoverflow.com/questions/65839418/what-is-the-alternative-of-passing-array-to-the-urlurl-too-long

Answer 1

You could use a form instead of a hyperlink to submit a POST request and send your paths in POST data. See below for example code

<form method="POST" action="{% url 'test_download' %}">
    {% csrf_token %}
    {% for path in paths %}
        <input type="hidden" name="paths" value="{{ path }}"
    {% endfor %}
    <button type="submit">Converted Files</button>
</form>