Simplifying Chat Applications with Node.js and WebSocket

Chat applications require real-time communication between clients and servers. Traditional HTTP requests can introduce latency and inefficiencies. This lesson focuses on using Node.js and WebSocket to create a simple chat application.

WebSocket is a protocol for full-duplex communication channels over a single TCP connection. It is designed to be used in real-time web applications, allowing for instant messaging and notifications without the overhead of HTTP.

To get started with WebSocket in Node.js, you need to install the ws library. Use the following command:

npm install ws

Below is a simple setup for a WebSocket server using Node.js:

const WebSocket = require('ws');
const server = new WebSocket.Server({ port: 8080 });

server.on('connection', (socket) => {
    socket.on('message', (message) => {
        console.log('Received: %s', message);
        server.clients.forEach(client => {
            if (client.readyState === WebSocket.OPEN) {
                client.send(message);
            }
        });
    });
});

Here’s how to connect to the WebSocket server from the client-side:

const socket = new WebSocket('ws://localhost:8080');

socket.onopen = () => {
    socket.send('Hello Server!');
};

socket.onmessage = (event) => {
    console.log('Message from server: ', event.data);
};

• Use secure WebSocket (wss) for production environments.
• Implement error handling on both client and server.
• Limit the number of connections to manage server load.
• Consider using a message queue for scalability.