Using WebSockets

WebSocket (ws://URL), or wss://URL for WebSocket Secure, is a bidirectional, low-latency, and high-speed protocol that builds on the TCP protocol. It uses HTTP(S) to make the connections (using ports 80 and 443, respectively), so it also needs the HTTP package. In a way, it combines characteristics of both UDP and TCP; it is message-based like UDP but also reliable and stateful like TCP. Chat services are among the most popular applications of WebSockets.

You can read data from or write data to a WebSocket, send ping or pong messages, and close the connection.

The WebSockets package can be found at https://github.com/JuliaWeb/WebSockets.jl, which contains a complete example of the chat service.

To start using the WebSockets package, add it via the REPL’s package mode:

(@v1.8) pkg> add WebSockets

The preceding command installs dependent packages such as URIs and HTTP and then precompiles them.

To set up a WebSocket, you need a URL and a...