Python: BaseHTTPRequestHandler - Read raw post

I think self.rfile.read(self.headers.getheader('content-length')) should return the raw data as a string. According to the docs directly inside the BaseHTTPRequestHandler class:

- rfile is a file object open for reading positioned at the
start of the optional input data part;

self.rfile.read(int(self.headers.getheader('Content-Length'))) will return the raw HTTP POST data as a string.

Breaking it down:

1. The header 'Content-Length' specifies how many bytes the HTTP POST data contains.
2. self.headers.getheader('Content-Length') returns the content length (value of the header) as a string.
3. This has to be converted to an integer before passing as parameter to self.rfile.read(), so use the int() function.

Also, note that the header name is case sensitive so it has to be specified as 'Content-Length' only.

Edit: Apparently header field is not case sensitive (at least in Python 2.7.5) which I believe is the correct behaviour since https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2616 states:

Each header field consists of a name followed by a colon (":") and the field value. Field names are case-insensitive.