WebSocket over Yamux over WebSocket not working - go

I was experimenting hashicorp/yamux over gorilla/websocket, and got stuck.
I started with vanilla WebSocket using the echo example from Gorilla WebSocket project. It was very a straight forward client-server setup. Then image that the server is now behind a firewall, thus the client cannot make a direct connection to it. So I introduced a hub and an agent. The hub is supposed to be publicly visible and connectable for the client. The agent would run alongside the server, who would first make a WebSocket connection to the hub and then multiplex the connection using Yamux so that the hub can then initiate requests to the server. In this way, I effectively "exposed" the server beyond the firewall.
For normal HTTP endpoints, things are good. The client can make requests to the hub, who would proxy these requests to the agent using the WebSocket connection initiated by the hub, and then the hub would further proxy these requests to the server.
However, this trick failed to work with WebSocket endpoints. For the echo example, the client can access the HTML on / through the hub-agent-server chain, but would fail on the /echo path, which is a WebSocket endpoint.
My question is, is this WebSocker over Yamux over WebSocket fundamentally impossible, or do I just need some extra lines to get things work? Here's the code I've been experimenting with. Really appreciate your helps!

Related

ActiveMQ - Stomp over websockets - Same Origin Policy

I have a process that runs in California that wants to talk to a process in New York, using Stomp over Websockets.
Also note that my process is not a web app, but I implemented a stomp over websocket client in C++, in order to connect things up to my backend. Maybe this was or wasn't a good idea. So, I want my client to talk to the server and subscribe, where their client pushed messages.
I was implementing my own server when I saw that ApacheMQ supported Stomp over Websockets. So, I started reading the docs.
It says with the last line under 'configuration' at
http://activemq.apache.org/websockets :
One thing worth noting is that web sockets (just as Ajax) implements ? > the same origin policy, so you can access only brokers running on the > same host as the web application running the client.
it says it again in several related searches such as http://sensatic.net/activemq/activemq-54-stomp-over-web-sockets.html
Is this a limitation of the server or the web client?
With that limitation, if I understand right, the server is not going to accept websocket connections from a client, of any kind, that is not on the same machine?
I am not sure I see the point of that...
If that is indeed its meaning, then how do I get around it in order to implement my scenario?
I've not found that bit of documentation you are referring to but from what I know of the STOMP implementation on the broker this seems incorrect. There shouldn't be any limit to the transport connector accepting connect requests from an outside host by default and I don't think the browser treats the websocket requests the same as it does other things like an Ajax case in terms of the same origin policy.
This probably a case that is best checked by actually trying it to see if it works, I've connected just fine from outside the same host using AMQP over websockets on ActiveMQ so I'd guess the STOMP stack should also work fine.

Can we host a host websocket server in cloud as proxy/relay server to redirect websocket traffic from local network

[This post has been updated with a possible approach, which is added to the bottom]
I am trying to create a web socket connection between two devices((A). chrome in different computer and (B) a raspberry pi) in different networks. Thus, i can send video data over websockets. However, I cannot port forward the network of my router to expose my local IP to the network, thus, I can't send the data right away.
Figure below explains the architechture.
Thus ,I am trying to implement a logic so that Device A websockets the public ws of the cloud while, the cloud actually gets the data from Device B.So Device A websockets device B indirectly.
Device A<==>Cloud Server<==>Device B
The cloud could be something like a proxy or a relay websocket server.
The video feed needs to be sent in real time,
Please suggest how can i proceed with it.
Additional note, i have acquired an instance of digitalocean as VPS, following the blog Accessing home services from anywhere, without port forwarding! but not sure how to proceed.
Update(11th Nov,2019):
I am planning to use a websocket server on DigitalOcean instance(droplet),which would be listening to my local IP/port of my raspberry pi.And this VPS would act as a websocket server,which would redirect the traffic.
However, I am unsure how to use the same.And need your kind suggestions.

How can I connect to sockJS from a client written in Go?

I have a server that uses websockets. It is written in Go. For testing, I have another application written in Go. To test, I start the server, then run the test client. The test client creates websocket connections to the server and does things (basically impersonating user activity). Both the client and the server are using the gorilla/websockets library, and standard browsers also work fine with the server.
This was all working beautifully.
To support non-compliant browsers, I was asked to start using the SockJS Go server library. I did this and the new version works just fine when used from a browser by clients using the SockJS library.
Now for the problem. SockJS does not accept incoming websocket connections. Only connections from the SockJS client. So my testing application doesn't work, and I'm unable to test.
I could recover the old version of my connection code from git and make a separate connection type that uses gorilla/websockets and have my server listen on an additional port that only listens on localhost. This would allow me to test the functionality. The downside is that I have to maintain two versions of essentially the same code, and I wouldn't be testing the real user experience and possibly not find bugs until production.
Ideally the SockJS server, considering it still uses gorilla/websockets as a dependency would automatically accept proper websocket connections, but barring that it seems I'd need a SockJS client library in Go which, as far as I can tell, doesn't exist.
Does anyone have a solution for this? Thanks!

How does WebSockets server architecture work?

I'm trying to get a better understanding of how the server-side architecture works for WebSockets with the goal of implementing it in an embedded application. It seems that there are 3 different server-side software components in play here: 1) the web server to serve static HTTP pages and handle upgrade request, 2) a WebSockets library such as libwebsockets to handle the "nuts and bolts" of WebSockets communications, and 3) my custom application to actually figure out what to do with incoming data. How do all these fit together? Is it common to have a separate web server and WebSocket handling piece, aka a WebSocket server/daemon?
How does my application communicate with the web server and/or WebSockets library to send/receive data? For example, with CGI, the web server uses environmental variables to send info to the custom application, and stdout to receive responses. What is the equivalent communication system here? Or do you typically link in a WebSocket library into the customer application? But then how would communication with the web server to the WebSocket library + custom application work? Or all 3 combined into a single component?
Here's why I am asking. I'm using the boa web server on a uClinux/no MMU platform on a Blackfin processor with limited memory. There is no native WebSocket support in boa, only CGI. I'm trying to figure out how I can add WebSockets support to that. I would prefer to use a compiled solution as opposed to something interpreted such as JavaScript, Python or PHP. My current application using long polling over CGI, which does not provide adequate performance for planned enhancements.
First off, it's important to understand how a webSocket connection is established because that plays into an important relationship between webSocket connections and your web server.
Every webSocket connection starts with an HTTP request. The browser sends an HTTP request to the host/port that the webSocket connection is requested on. That request might look something like this:
GET /chat HTTP/1.1
Host: example.com:8000
Upgrade: websocket
Connection: Upgrade
Sec-WebSocket-Key: dGhlIHNhbXBsZSBub25jZQ==
Sec-WebSocket-Version: 13
What distinguishes this request from any other HTTP request to that server is the Upgrade: websocket header in the request. This tells the HTTP server that this particular request is actually a request to initiate a webSocket connection. This header also allows the web server to tell the difference between a regular HTTP request and a request to open a webSocket connection. This allows something very important in the architecture and it was done this way entirely on purpose. This allows the exact same server and port to be used for both serving your web requests and for webSocket connections. All that is needed is a component on your web server that looks for this Upgrade header on all incoming HTTP connections and, if found, it takes over the connection and turns it into a webSocket connection.
Once the server recognizes this upgrade header, it responds with a legal HTTP response, but one that signals the client that the upgrade to the webSocket protocol has been accepted that looks like this:
HTTP/1.1 101 Switching Protocols
Upgrade: websocket
Connection: Upgrade
Sec-WebSocket-Accept: s3pPLMBiTxaQ9kYGzzhZRbK+xOo=
At that point, both client and server keep that socket from the original HTTP request open and both switch to the webSocket protocol.
Now, to your specific questions:
How does my application communicate with the web server and/or
WebSockets library to send/receive data?
Your application may use the built-in webSocket support in modern browsers and can initiate a webSocket connection like this:
var socket = new WebSocket("ws://www.example.com");
This will instruct the browser to initiate a webSocket connection to www.example.com use the same port that the current web page was connected with. Because of the built-in webSocket support in the browser, the above HTTP request and upgrade protocol is handled for you automatically from the client.
On the server-side of things, you need to make sure you are using a web server that has incoming webSocket support and that the support is enabled and configured. Because a webSocket connection is a continuous connection once established, it does not really follow the CGI model at all. There must be at least one long-running process handling live webSocket connections. In server models (like CGI), you would need some sort of webServer add-on that supports this long-running process for your webSocket connections. In a server environment like node.js which is already a long running process, the addition of webSockets is no change at all architecturally - but rather just an additional library to support the webSocket protocol.
I'd suggest you may find this article interesting as it discussions this transition from CGI-style single request handling to the continuous socket connections of webSocket:
Web Evolution: from CGI to Websockets (and how it will help you better monitor your cloud infrastructure)
If you really want to stick with the stdin/stdout model, there are libraries that model that for your for webSockets. Here's one such library. Their tagline is "It's like CGI, twenty years later, for WebSockets".
I'm trying to figure out how I can add WebSockets support to that. I
would prefer to use a compiled solution as opposed to something
interpreted such as JavaScript, Python or PHP.
Sorry, but I'm not familiar with that particular server environment. It will likely take some in-depth searching to find out what your options are. Since a webSocket connection is a continuous connection, then you will need a process that is running continuously that can be the server-side part of the webSocket connection. This can either be something built into your webServer or it can be an additional process that the webServer starts up and forwards incoming connections to.
FYI, I have a custom application at home here built on a Raspberry Pi that uses webSockets for real-time communication with browser web pages and it works just fine. I happen to be using node.js for the server environment and the socket.io library that runs on top of webSockets to give me a higher level interface on top of webSockets. My server code checks several hardware sensors on a regular interval and then whenever there is new/changed data to report, it sends messages down any open webSockets so the connected browsers get real-time updates on the sensor readings.
You would likely need some long-running application that incoming webSocket connections were passed from the web server to your long running process or you'd need to make the webSocket connections on a different port than your web server (so they could be fielded by a completely different server process) in which case you'd have a whole separate server to handle your webSocket requests and sockets (this server would also have to support CORS to enable browsers to connect to it since it would be a different port than your web pages).

Unsolicited notifications from server to client over http

I am working on a dropbox like system and I am wondering how the client gets notified when the files change on the server side. It is my impression that both dropbox and ubuntu one operate over HTTP ports and work as follows:
1. if files change on client machine, inotify detects it and preforms a push from the client to the server. (I get this part)
2. if files change on the server a simple unsolicited notification (just a message saying "time to sync") is sent from the server to the client. Then the client initiates a sync to the server.
I dont really care which language I do this in. I am just wondering how the client gets contacted. Specifically, what if a client is behind a firewall with its own local IP addresses. How does the server locate it?
Also, what kind of messaging protocols would be used to do something like this? I was planning on doing this over HTTP or SSH, but I have no attachment do that.
I'm not sure what Dropbox is using, but it could be websockets (unlikely, it's a pretty new and not widely deployed thing) or more likely a pending Ajax request from the client to the server -- to which the server only responds when it has new stuff for the client. The latter is the common way to implement (well, OK -- "hack";-) some form of "server push" with HTTP.
It took a little research into networking to see how this would work, but it is far more trivial then I expected. I am now using standard Java sockets for this. Start up the server process which listens for a socket connection. Then start up the client which connects to the server.
Once the connection is made, messages can be sent back and fourth. This works through NAT (network address translation) which is standard method for routing packets on private networks behind a firewall.

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