Apache HttpClient Persistent Connection usage

Question

What is the right way for me to use the same TCP connection when using Apache HttpClient?

My code currently is:

CloseableHttpClient httpClient = HttpClients.createDefault();
HttpClientContext httpContext = HttpClientContext.create();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++)
{
    CloseableHttpResponse response = httpClient.execute(new HttpGet("http://www.google.co.uk"), httpContext);
    String responseBody = EntityUtils.toString(response.getEntity());
    EntityUtils.consume(response.getEntity());
    response.close();
}

I have tried using the code with and without response.close() but the times vary each run that I can't figure out which one is keeping the connection open.

Can somebody please explain to me how I can keep the connection open?

Answer 1

So after messing around with TCPView I figured out that placing the lines:

CloseableHttpClient httpClient = HttpClients.createDefault();
HttpClientContext httpContext = HttpClientContext.create();

inside of the loop used a new TCP connection each time. Turns out that HttpClient will automatically try and reuse the connection for the same 'HttpClient' object.