Setup Charles Proxy for macOS, iOS Guide
Charles Proxy is an HTTP proxy and monitoring tool for view or debugging or editing all of the HTTP and SSL / HTTPS traffic between their machine/ applications and the Internet by developer or QAs. For example, this includes requests’ body and headers, responses’ body and headers, the cookies, and caching information.
Now, let's start with installations.
Step1: Download and install Charles Proxy to our computer
Click this URL and select the macOS option and download the dmg file: https://www.charlesproxy.com/download/. Start installation and follow steps. Click the “Agree” button for the first page and drop to Applications.
Now we need to trust the certificate for use Charles. Open Charles Proxy Menu -> Help -> SSL Proxying -> Install Charles Root Certificate and click this options. You should see Keychain Access. Search “Charles” and open trust settings.
When you select “Always Trust” you should see the blue signal on the same page like this.
Now we will add Locations that we will use for debugging from Charles Proxy Menu -> Proxy -> SSL Proxying Settings -> SSL Proxying tab. If you want to debug your own applications or web pages, you can add your endpoints to this Location list.
Step 2: Download and Install Charles Proxy Certificate to Your iPhone
We will open guidance for the install certificate from Charles. Charles Menu -> Help -> SSL Proxying -> Install … on Mobile Device or Remote Browser options and follow this directions.
Now we make sure our phone and pc connect to same wi-fi. We have to connect the phone to this IP: Port address and browse chls.pro/ssl page. Click info message next to wi-fi name, select Configure Proxy tab.
Select Manuel option, enter this IP to Server input line, port this Port input line, and click the Save button.
Now you should see a connection request for use of this IP and port, click Allow for this.
Browse chls.pro/ssl site and click pop-up’s Allow.
If you download the certificate you should see an info message pop-up and click Close.
Now we have to trust this certificate and we do this under this path; Settings-> General -> About -> Certificate Trust Settings and select Charles Proxy CA (date, name) and activate it. Select Continue of course.
The next thing is to install the profile from this path Settings -> General -> Profiles & Device Management and select Charles Proxy CA.
Click the Install button and start the installation. It just takes a few seconds. When you installed the certificate you should see a success message and a green Verified line.
Now you can control Charles Proxy from your computer and you have to see all APIs. For example, you can see Medium’s update request and response body.
As you can see many URLs on the left side but sometimes this number can be hundreds of URLs that's why you can select the Focus option and you can see the selected URLs on the first line. (Click right on URL and select Focus).
PS. Make sure to turn off your Proxy setting otherwise you can’t use other applications. :)
My next article will be about Rewrite and Breakpoints on Charles Proxy.
Thank you for reading.