

Web Sockets Now Available In Google Chrome - gps408
http://blog.chromium.org/2009/12/web-sockets-now-available-in-google.html

======
izend
I can abandon Flash sockets if this becomes mainstream.

------
cracki

      ws.onclose = function() { // websocket is closed. };
    

someone reformatted the code without checking...

------
spazmaster
Great, with Apple, Mozilla and now Google innovating in the browser sphere, it
looks like browser will be evolving at a much more rapid pace.

Gah, let's hope Microsoft gets some vision for IE too. (or ditch it like Bing
ditched Live)

~~~
umjames
I agree, but I'd rather have users get some vision. You'd be surprised how
many people still use IE6, even though Microsoft wants them to upgrade. Less-
savvy users don't switch unless:

1\. They have to (meaning their current methods no longer do anything or the
software or hardware no longer works).

2\. Someone more savvy does it for them and teaches them the new software.
Usually this happens after #1.

Unfortunately, I don't know if there's much we can do about this kind of user.
We shouldn't (and won't) have to hold ourselves back because they refuse to
upgrade.

~~~
TallGuyShort
In addition to what danielrhodes says in his reply about corporate IT
departments having legitimate reasons not to upgrade - I'd like to add that my
biggest pet peeve is when someone asks me to see if I can fix their computer,
and it's obvious that every IT-enthusiast before me has insisted that this
person switch to -INSERT BROWSER HERE-. I helped a gentleman last week that
used MSN because he found it intuitive, but had Firefox, Opera, Chrome and IE
installed. Then there was the mountain of anti-spyware software everyone had
installed. After uninstalling the browsers he didn't like or use (despite them
being "better" according to most IT professionals) and uninstalling the
spyware blockers, his computer worked just fine.

We need to remember that our job is to make the computer better for other
people - not just ourselves. I'm amazed at the rate of development I've seen
in browser technology, but let's not forget the millions of people that just
want to get online and send an email. If we rush to upgrade everyone to
"better" technology - we might end up ruining their experience.

~~~
enjo
My dad was in a similar camp. It had NOTHING to do with the browser, and
everything to do with the yahoo! branded logo that SBC had installed for him.
To him that logo __is __the internet.

For a host of reasons I ended setting him up with Chrome, imported his
bookmarks, and changed the shortcut. Now the magic Yahoo! logo opens Chrome
instead and he couldn't be more trhilled.

------
joblessjunkie
Are there any examples of web sockets live right now? I'd like to see it in
action...

------
rbranson
As the saying goes: "that's awesome, if only it worked on IE6..."

~~~
bumblebird
If you care about IE6 these days, and aren't selling to corporate users forced
to use it, then you're doing something wrong.

Also, you can just enable it when it's available, and fallback to comet etc
when it's not.

~~~
IgorPartola
I think the main issue here is not IE6 but all the modern browsers (FF 3.5,
Safari 4, IE8) that do not support this feature. Targeting Chrome users only
is not that appealing.

~~~
freetard
The feature was added to webkit so both safari, chrome and other will get the
feature and so is firefox
<https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=472529>

------
laktek
I've implemented a Ruby version of WebSocket server (which is based on
EventMachine and yet very experimental) - <http://github.com/laktek/Web-
Socket-Examples>

------
k7d
The main challenge with bidirectional browser communication is really in the
backend. It does not scale nearly as easy as easy as RESTful HTTP requests.

I'm sure Google has developed some serious technology to address this while
building Wave. Wondering if some of it come to Google AppEngine anytime soon?

------
est
> The protocol is not raw TCP because it needs to provide the browser's "same-
> origin" security model. It's also not HTTP because web socket traffic
> differers from HTTP's request-response model.

If Websocket has something like crossdomain.xml does that mean we can build
p2p applications on that?

~~~
duskwuff
No - it doesn't have a passive mode.

------
bumblebird
Does the WebSocket spec allow for gzip/deflating streams as well? I can't see
anywhere if it does or not.

~~~
DrJokepu
A quick Google search (<http://www.google.com/search?q=websocket+compression>)
revealed that it's not supported yet, however it might get added in a future
version: [http://www.ietf.org/mail-
archive/web/hybi/current/msg00789.h...](http://www.ietf.org/mail-
archive/web/hybi/current/msg00789.html)

------
oomkiller
I'd like to see an Erlang implementation of a WebSocket server, anyone know if
this has been attempted?

~~~
marketer
Not sure if there's one in erlang, but go has a websocket server built into
the standard library:

<http://golang.org/pkg/websocket/>

------
daleharvey
google confuse me

how was this implemented before local storage? every current version of
browsers supports it apart from chrome (and opera?)

saying that it is pretty awesome, web sockets have been a long time coming

