Python 2.6.4, Windows XP.

If you run the following code:

import httplib

http_connection = httplib.HTTPConnection("192.168.192.196")
http_connection.request("GET", "/")
http_connection.sock.settimeout(20)
response = http_connection.getresponse()
data = response.read()
http_connection.close()


And then run a netstat -a, you'll see that the connection is no longer established (it'll have a status of TIME_WAIT or something along those lines).

However, if you run the following code:

import httplib

http_connection = httplib.HTTPSConnection("192.168.192.196")
http_connection.request("GET", "/")
http_connection.sock.settimeout(20)
response = http_connection.getresponse()
data = response.read()
http_connection.close()

And run a netstat, the connection will still be in the ESTABLISHED state.  The connection does not end for several minutes (or when you terminate the program).

I can get the connection to end when I want it by doing a del on the connection object and then manually running garbage collection - although that seems a bit wonky.

I'm not really sure what all the differences are between HTTPConnection and HTTPSConnection, but it seems like they should both behave the same way in this regard.