I'm using this AutobahnJS code in node to receive data from a service. It works great, getting multiple events per second. When my internet temporarily disconnects Autobahn does not detect the lost connection and does not write "Websocket connection dropped" to console, it just hangs. Indefinitely.
Is there a timeout one can set, if no data arrives after 1 minute, reconnect? Or can I use a setTimeout function to ping a server and if no pong returns close the connection and try to reopen it?
I googled till my fingers were bleeding, but I didn't find a straightforward answer to this question. Thank you very much!
connection.onopen = function(session) {
session.subscribe(arg, someEvent);
}
connection.onclose = function() {
console.log("Websocket connection dropped");
}
connection.open();
It is not possible to recognize an unclean disconnect without some data being sent. The WebSocket ping/pong mechanism at the protocol level is not exposed in the browser, and Autobahn|JS does not have any different handling when running in Node.js.
For the time being, you need to implement your own ping/pong mechanism at the application level.
On my client (a phone with a browser) I want to see the stats of the server CPU,RAM & HDD and gather info from various logs.
I'm using ajax polling.
On the client every 5 sec (setInterval) I call a PHP file:
scan a folder containing N logs
read the last line of each log
convert that to JSON
Problems:
Open new connection every 5 sec.
Multiple AJAX calls.
Request headers (they are also data and so consume bandwidth)
Response headers (^)
Use PHP to read files every 5 sec. even if nothing changed.
The final JSON data is less than 5 KB, but I send it every 5 sec, and there are the headers and new connection every time, so basically every 5 sec., I have to send 5-10 KB to get 5 KB which are 10-20 KB.
Those are 60 sec / 5 sec = 12 new connections per minute and about 15 MB per hour of traffic if I leave the app open.
Lets say I have 100 users that I let monitor / control my server that would be around 1.5 GB outgoing traffic in one hour.
Not to mention that the PHP server is reading multiple files 100 times every 5 sec.
I need something that on the server reads the last lines of those logs every 5 sec and maybe writes them to a file, then I want to push this data to the client only if it's changed.
SSE (server sent events) with PHP
header('Content-Type: text/event-stream');
header('Cache-Control: no-cache');
while(true){
echo "id: ".time()."\ndata: ".ReadTheLogs()."\n\n";
ob_flush();
flush();
sleep(1);
}
In this case after the connection is established with the first user
the connection keeps open (PHP is not made for that) and so I save some space (request headers,response headers). This work on my server bu most server don't allow to keep the connection open for long time.
Also with multiple users I read the log multiple times.(slowing down my old server)
And I can't control the server ... I would need to use ajax to send a command...
I need WebSockets!!!
node.js and websockets
using node.js, from what i understand, i can do all this without consuming alot
of resources and bandwich. The connection keeps open so no unnecessary headers, i can recieve and send data.it handles multiple users very well.
And this is where i need your help.
the node.js server should in background update, and store the logs data every 5 sec if the files are modified.OR should that do the operating system with (iwatch,dnotify...)
the data should be pushed only if changed.
the reading of the logs should be happen only one time after 5 sec ... so not triggered by each user.
this is the first example i have found.....and modified..
var ws=require("nodejs-websocket");
var server=ws.createServer(function(conn){
var data=read(whereToStoreTheLogs);
conn.sendText(data)// send the logs data to the user
//on first connection.
setTimeout(checkLogs,5000);
/*
here i need to continuosly check if the logs are changed.
but if i use setInterval(checkLogs,5000) or setTimeout
every user invokes a new timer and so having lots of timers on the server
can i do that in background?
*/
conn.on("text",function(str){
doStuff(str); // various commands to control the server.
})
conn.on("close",function(code,reason){
console.log("Connection closed")
})
}).listen(8001);
var checkLogs=function(){
var data=read(whereToStoreTheLogs);
if(data!=oldData){
conn.sendText(data)
}
setTimeout(checkLogs,5000);
}
the above script would be the notification server, but i also need to find a solution to store somwhere the info of those multiple logs and do that everytime something is changed, in the background.
How would you do to keep the bandwich low but also the server resources.
How would you do?
EDIT
Btw. is there a way to stream this data simultaneosly to all the clinets?
EDIT
About the logs: i also want to be able to scale the time dilatation between updates... i mean if i read the logs of ffmpeg i ned the update every sec if possible... but when no conversion is active.. i need to get the basic machine info every 5min maybe ... and so on...
GOALS:
1. performant way to read & store somewhere the logs data (only if clinets connected...[mysql,file, it's possible to store this info inside the ram(with node.js??)]).
2. performant way to stream the data to the various clients (simultanously).
3. be able to send commands to the server.. (bidirectional)
4. using web languages (js,php...), lunix commands( something that is easy to implement on multiple machines).. free software if needed.
best approach would be:
read the logs, based on current activity, to the system memory and stream simultaneously and continuosly, with an already open connection, to the various clients with webSockets.
i'don't know anything that could be faster.
UPDATE
The node.js server is up and running, using the http://einaros.github.io/ws/ webSocketServer implementation, as it appears to be the fastest one.
I wrote with the help of #HeadCode the following code to handle properly the client situation & to keep the process as low as possible. checking various things inside the broadcast loop. Now the pushing & the client handling is at a good point.
var
wss=new (require('ws').Server)({port:8080}),
isBusy,
logs,
clients,
i,
checkLogs=function(){
if(wss.clients&&(clients=wss.clients.length)){
isBusy||(logs=readLogs()/*,isBusy=true*/);
if(logs){
i=0;
while(i<clients){
wss.clients[i++].send(logs)
}
}
}
};
setInterval(checkLogs,2000);
But atm i'm using a really bad way to parse the logs.. (nodejs->httpRequest->php).. lol. After some googling i found out that i totally could stream the output of linux software directly to the nodejs app ... i didn't checked... but maybe that would be the best way to do it. node.js also has a filesystem api where icould read the logs. linux has it's own filesystem api.
the readLogs()(can be async) function is still something i'm not happy with.
nodejs filesystem?
linuxSoftware->nodejs output implementation
linux filesystem api.
keep in mind that i need to scan various folders for logs and then parse somehow the outputted data, and this every 2 seconds.
ps.: i adde isBusy to the server variables in case the logReading sytem is async.
EDIT
Answer is not complete.
Missing:
A performant way to read,parse and store the logs somewhere (linux filesystem api, or nodejs api, so the i store directly into system memory)
An explaination if it's possible to stream data directly to multiple users .
apparently nodejs loops trough the clients and so (i think) sending multiple times the data.
btw is it possible/worth to close the node server if there are no clients and restart on new connections on the apache side. (ex: if i connect to the apache hosted html file a script launches the nodejs server again). doing so would further reduce the memory leaking???right?
EDIT
After some experimenting with websockets (some videos are in the comments) i learned some new stuff. Raspberry PI has the possibility to use some CPU DMA channels to to high frequency stuff like PWM... i need to somehow understand how that works.
When using sensors and stuff like that i should store everything inside the RAM, nodejs already does that?? (in a variable inside the script)
websocket remains the best choice as it's basically easely accessible from any device now, simply using a browser.
I haven't used nodejs-websocket, but it looks like it will accept an http connection and do the upgrade as well as creating the server. If all you care about receiving is text/json then I suppose that would be fine, but it seems to me you might want to serve a web page along with it.
Here is a way to use express and socket.io to achieve what you're asking about:
var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var http = require('http').Server(app);
var io = require('socket.io')(http);
app.use(express.static(__dirname + '/'));
app.get('/', function(req, res){
res.sendfile('index.html');
});
io.on('connection', function(socket){
// This is where we should emit the cached values of everything
// that has been collected so far so this user doesn't have to
// wait for a changed value on the monitored host to see
// what is going on.
// This code is based on something I wrote for myself so it's not
// going to do anything for you as is. You'll have to implement
// your own caching mechanism.
for (var stat in cache) {
if (cache.hasOwnProperty(stat)) {
socket.emit('data', JSON.stringify(cache[stat]));
}
}
});
http.listen(3000, function(){
console.log('listening on *:3000');
});
(function checkLogs(){
var data=read(whereToStoreTheLogs);
if(data!=oldData){
io.emit(data)
}
setTimeout(checkLogs,5000);
})();
Of course, the checkLogs function has to be fleshed out by you. I have only cut and pasted it in here for context. The call to the emit function of the io object will send the message out to all connected users but the checkLogs function will only fire once (and then keep calling itself), not every time someone connects.
In your index.html page you can have something like this. It should be included in the html page at the bottom, just before the closing body tag.
<script src="/path/to/socket.io.js"></script>
<script>
// Set up the websocket for receiving updates from the server
var socket = io();
socket.on('data', function(msg){
// Do something with your message here, such as using javascript
// to display it in an appropriate spot on the page.
document.getElementById("content").innerHTML = msg;
});
</script>
By the way, check out the Nodejs documentation for a variety of built-in methods for checking system resources (https://nodejs.org/api/os.html).
Here's also a solution more in keeping with what it appears you want. Use this for your html page:
<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>WS example</title>
</head>
<body>
<script>
var connection;
window.addEventListener("load", function () {
connection = new WebSocket("ws://"+window.location.hostname+":8001")
connection.onopen = function () {
console.log("Connection opened")
}
connection.onclose = function () {
console.log("Connection closed")
}
connection.onerror = function () {
console.error("Connection error")
}
connection.onmessage = function (event) {
var div = document.createElement("div")
div.textContent = event.data
document.body.appendChild(div)
}
});
</script>
</body>
</html>
And use this as your web socket server code, recently tweaked to use the 'tail' module (as found in this post: How to do `tail -f logfile.txt`-like processing in node.js?), which you will have to install using npm (Note: tail makes use of fs.watch, which is not guaranteed to work the same everywhere):
var ws = require("nodejs-websocket")
var os = require('os');
Tail = require('tail').Tail;
tail = new Tail('./testlog.txt');
var server = ws.createServer(function (conn) {
conn.on("text", function (str) {
console.log("Received " + str);
});
conn.on("close", function (code, reason) {
console.log("Connection closed");
});
}).listen(8001);
setInterval(function(){ checkLoad(); }, 5000);
function broadcast(mesg) {
server.connections.forEach(function (conn) {
conn.sendText(mesg)
})
}
var load = '';
function checkLoad(){
var new_load = os.loadavg().toString();
if (new_load === 'load'){
return;
}
load = new_load;
broadcast(load);
}
tail.on("line", function(data) {
broadcast(data);
});
Obviously this is very basic and you will have to change it for your needs.
I had made a similar implementation recently using Munin . Munin is a wonderful server monitoring tool, open source too which also provides a REST API. There several plugins available for your needs monitoring CPU, HDD and RAM usage of your server.
You need to build a push notification server. All clients who are listening, will then get a push notification when new data is updated. See this answer for more information: PHP - Push Notifications
As to how you would update the data, I'd suggest using OS-based tools to trigger a PHP script (command line) that will generate an "push" the json file out to any client currently listening. Any new client logging on to "listen" will get served the current json available, until it's updated.
This way you're not subject to 100 users using 100 connections and how much ever bandwidth to poll your server every 5 seconds, and only get updated when they need to know there's an update.
How about a service that reads all the log info (via IPMI, Nagios or whatever) and creates the output files on some schedule. Then anyone that wants to connect can just read this output rather than hammering the server logs. Essentially have one hit on the server logs then everyone else just reads a web page.
This could be implemented pretty easily.
BTW: Nagios has a v nice free edition
Answering just these bits of your question:
performant way to stream the data to the various clients (simultanously).
be able to send commands to the server.. (bidirectional)
using web languages (js,php...), lunix commands( something that is easy to implement on multiple machines).. free software if needed.
I'll recommend the Bayeux protocol as made simple by the CometD project. There are implementations in a variety of languages and it's really easy to use in its simplest form.
Meteor is broadly similar. It's an application development framework rather than a family of libraries, but it solves the same problems.
Some suggestions:
Munin for charts
NetSNMP (used by Munin, but you can also use Bash and Cron to build traps that send SMS texts on alerts)
Pingdom for remote alerts about how well the server is responding to ping and HTTP checks. It can SMS text you or call a phone, as well as have call escalation rules.
Hi i am having trouble with creating a socket communication from java script code.
I am always getting error while sending a message or closing the socket from server.
My Socket server code.
// Start listening for connections.
while (true)
{
Console.WriteLine("Waiting for a connection...");
// Program is suspended while waiting for an incoming connection.
Socket handler = listener.Accept();
data = null;
// An incoming connection needs to be processed.
while (true)
{
int bytesRec = handler.Receive(bytes);
data += Encoding.ASCII.GetString(bytes, 0, bytesRec);
break;
}
// Show the data on the console.
Console.WriteLine("Text received : {0}", data);
// Echo the data back to the client.
byte[] msg = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(data);
handler.Send(msg);
handler.Shutdown(SocketShutdown.Both);
handler.Close();
}
JavaScript code:
var connection = new WebSocket('ws://Myip:11000', ['soap', 'xmpp']);
// When the connection is open, send some data to the server
connection.onopen = function () {
connection.send('Ping'); // Send the message 'Ping' to the server
connection.send('your message');
};
// Log errors
connection.onerror = function (error) {
console.log('WebSocket Error ' + error);
};
connection.onclose = function (msg) {
console.log('WebSocket Error ' + msg);
};
It gets connected to server socket, but always gets error while closing or sending a message from server.
If this is really your actual code:
handler.Send(msg);
handler.Shutdown(SocketShutdown.Both);
handler.Close();
…then it's pretty broken. First, you can't assume that Socket.Send() actually sends all the bytes you asked it to. You have to check the return value, and keep sending until you've actually sent all the data.
Second, the initiation of a graceful closure should use SocketShutdown.Send, not SocketShutdown.Both. Specifying "Both" means (among other things) that you're not going to wait for the other end to negotiate the graceful closure. That you're just done and won't even receive any more data, in addition to being done sending.
And of course, the code is calling Close() before the other end has in fact acknowledged the graceful closure (by itself sending any remaining data it wanted to send and then shutting down with "Both").
Is all this the reason for your problem? I can't say for sure, since I have no way to test your actual code. But it's certainly a reasonable guess. If you tear down the connection without waiting after you try to send something, there's not any guarantee that the data will ever leave your machine, and in any case the other end could easily see the connection reset before it gets a chance to process any data that was sent to it.
There aren't a huge number of rules when it comes to socket programming, but what rules exist are there for a reason and are generally really important to follow. You should make sure your code is following all the rules.
(The rest of the code is also different from what I'd consider the right way to do things, but the problems aren't entirely fatal, the way that the over-eager connection destruction is).
I am afraid WebSocket does not work that way.
When the Javascript code connects to the server, it will send a HTTP request as ASCII text. That request will include a HTTP header Sec-WebSocket-Protocol: soap, xmpp, as you are requiring those protocols in your WebSocket creation.
Since your server code does not reply with an appropiate HTTP response accepting the websocket connection, the connection will fail. When you try to send data back, the client will not recognize it as a HTTP response and a error will be thrown.
A websocket is not a regular socket connection, it won't work that way. It requires HTTP negotiation and there is a schema for data framing. I recommend you to go through this article that explains very well how it works: http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1230000000545/ch17.html
If you are interested in learning how to develop a server, take a look to this tutorial in MDN: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/WebSockets/Writing_WebSocket_server I also have an open source WebSocket server in C# you can take a look if you like.
I'm trying to make a websocket using jQuery which is triggered continually after the load of the page. The idea, is to get information continually from the server and to display them into the web page without any refresh.
What kind of event is?
Any brilliant idea, please?
setInterval can be dangerous because of the timing of your http request/response. Better to used chained setTimeouts, e.g.
var tick = function() {
// do something here
$('foo').toggle();
setTimeout(tick, 1000); // wait 1 second and call again
};
tick();
I think an HTML5 Websocket is what you are looking for.
The WebSocket specification defines an API establishing "socket" connections between a web browser and a server. In plain words: There is an persistent connection between the client and the server and both parties can start sending data at any time.
http://html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/websockets/basics
I'm making a multiplayer (2 player) browser game in JavaScript. Every move a player makes will be sent to a server and validated before being transmitted to the opponent. Since WebSockets isn't ready for prime time yet, I'm looking at long polling as a method of transmitting the data and node.js looks quite interesting! I've gone through some example code (chat examples, standard long polling examples and suchlike) but all the examples I've seen seem to broadcast everything to every client, something I'm hoping to avoid. For general server messages this is fine but I want two players to be able to square off in a lobby or so and go into "private messaging" mode.
So I'm wondering if there's a way to implement private messaging between two clients using nodejs as a validating bridge? Something like this:
ClientA->nodejs: REQUEST
nodejs: VALIDATE REQUEST
nodejs->ClientA: VALID
nodejs->ClientB: VALID REQUEST FROM ClientA
You need some way to keep track of which clients are in a lobby together. You can do this with a simple global array like so process.lobby[1] = Array(ClientASocket, ClientBSocket) or something similar (possibly with some additional data, like nicknames and such), where the ClientXSocket is the socket object of each client that connects.
Now you can hook the lobby id (1 in this case) onto each client's socket object. A sort of session variable (without the hassle of session ids) if you will.
// i just made a hashtable to put all the data in,
// so that we don't clutter up the socket object too much.
socket.sessionData['lobby'] = 1;
What this allows you to do also, is add an event hook in the socket object, so that when the client disconnects, the socket can remove itself from the lobby array immediately, and message the remaining clients that this client has disconnected.
// see link in paragraph above for removeByValue
socket.on('close', function(err) {
process.lobby[socket.sessionData['lobby']].removeByValue(socket);
// then notify lobby that this client has disconnected.
});
I've used socket in place of the net.Stream or request.connection or whatever the thing is.
Remember in HTTP if you don't have keep-alive connections, this will make the TCP connection close, and so of course make the client unable to remain within a lobby. If you're using a plain TCP connection without HTTP on top (say within a Flash application or WebSockets), then you should be able to keep it open without having to worry about keep-alive. There are other ways to solve this problem than what I've shown here, but I hope I got you started at least. The key is keeping a persistent object for each client.
Disclaimer: I'm not a Node.js expert (I haven't even gotten around to installing it yet) but I have been reading up on it and I'm very familiar with browser js, so I'm hoping this is helpful somehow.