Basic Authentication Webpage Login VB.NET - vb.net

Question

Hey all, I am having an issue with trying to automate our UPS installations. The webpage uses basic authentication and prompts for a login when loading the page. We do not have access to the registry to enable this feature in IE since it was disabled. I have tried useing an httpwebrequest and response to pull the cookie but it doesn't ever appear to send one back. My logic for that was going to be to use that cookie for the web browser control so it wouldn't then ask for the login. Here is my code that I have for that:
Dim request As HttpWebRequest = DirectCast(WebRequest.Create("http://10.106.206.249"), HttpWebRequest)
Dim mycache = New CredentialCache()
mycache.Add(New Uri("http://10.106.206.249"), "Basic", New NetworkCredential("User", "Pass"))
request.Credentials = mycache
request.UserAgent = "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.14) Gecko/20080404 Firefox/2.0.0.14"
request.CookieContainer = New CookieContainer()
Dim response As HttpWebResponse = CType(request.GetResponse(), HttpWebResponse)
Dim cook As Cookie
For Each cook In response.Cookies
Console.WriteLine("Cookie:")
Console.WriteLine("{0} = {1}", cook.Name, cook.Value)
Console.WriteLine("Domain: {0}", cook.Domain)
Console.WriteLine("Path: {0}", cook.Path)
Console.WriteLine("Port: {0}", cook.Port)
Console.WriteLine("Secure: {0}", cook.Secure)
Console.WriteLine("When issued: {0}", cook.TimeStamp)
Console.WriteLine("Expires: {0} (expired? {1})", cook.Expires, cook.Expired)
Console.WriteLine("Don't save: {0}", cook.Discard)
Console.WriteLine("Comment: {0}", cook.Comment)
Console.WriteLine("Uri for comments: {0}", cook.CommentUri)
Console.WriteLine("Version: RFC {0}", IIf(cook.Version = 1, "2109", "2965"))
' Show the string representation of the cookie.
Console.WriteLine("String: {0}", cook.ToString())
Next cook
I know this works to some extent because if I use the incorrect creds I get an unathorized error thrown. So it appears either I am not catching the cookie or one is not being sent.
Another way I have tried is by sending a header with a regular Web.Navigate but that just acts like it is loading the page and prompts for login:
Dim authData
Dim authHeader As String
authData = System.Text.UnicodeEncoding.UTF8.GetBytes("User:Pass")
authHeader = "Authorization: Basic: " & System.Convert.ToBase64String(System.Text.Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes("User:Pass")) & Chr(13) & Chr(10)
Web.Navigate("http://10.106.206.249", False, Nothing, authHeader)
Anyone have any insight to see if maybe I am just doing something wrong here?

Answer 1

A simpler solution would be this:
Web.Navigate("http://Administrator:retail#10.106.206.249")
Note that if you have an #-sign in your password you'll have to UrlEncode it. (I'm not 100% sure whether the password will still work then)