Request Message
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A Request Message is a message that a client program sends to a server to ask it to perform an operation or return data, and that expects a response.
- AKA: Data Request Message, Client Request.
- Context:
- It can (typically) be answered by a response message from the server, in a request–response pattern.
- It can be sent synchronously, with the client waiting for the response, as in web service calls over HTTP.
- It can carry, on a user's behalf, a request in the speech-act sense, but it is itself a message between programs, not a speech act.
- ...
- Example(s):
- HTTP Request Messages, such as:
- API Requests sent to a web service.
- ...
- Counter-Example(s):
- An Email Message, a sibling message, which is sent one way without waiting for a response.
- A response message, which answers a request rather than making one.
- A Request, a directive speech act between people or agents, rather than a message between programs.
- A message published under a publish–subscribe pattern, which goes to any subscribers rather than asking a particular server to act.
- ...
- See: Message, Client-Server Architecture, Server Software System, HTTP Request Message.
References
2025
- Wikipedia. (2025). Request–response. Article revision of 2025-05-19. Retrieved 2026-10-15; archived snapshot of 2026-10-12. Supports the definition, synchronous calls and the one-way contrast: request–response is "one of the basic methods computers use to communicate with each other in a network", in which "the first computer sends a request for some data and the second responds to the request"; it can be synchronous, such as "web service calls over HTTP"; it "is especially common in client–server architectures"; one-way communication "sends a message without waiting for a response", as email does.