title: Making HTTP requests with Clojure
body: <p>I've just started learning Clojure and am struggling with the API changes over the past few years.  In particular, in 1.2 there was an http-agent function in contrib which allowed for really simple HTTP requests:</p>
  
  <pre><code> (http-agent "http..." :method "POST" :body "foo=1") 
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This function was removed and it seems that now you should either use <strong>clojure.java.io</strong> or a 3rd party solution like <strong>http-kit</strong> or <strong>clj-http</strong>.  </p>
  
  <p>I'm really surprised as <code>java.io</code> seems much lower-level and loses the simplicity or http-agent and making http requests seems like something that should be in the core set of libraries (I realise this is very subjective).  </p>
  
  <p>What's the rationale for the removal of http-agent? Did it not fit with a core philosophy of Clojure? And what are <strong>recommendations for the best library to use for basic HTTP requests</strong>?</p>