Clearing socket.io send buffer after connection timeout

[TimNZ]

Tip for people who may not be aware of this behaviour.

Below is my code for a browser client.

An unexpected behaviour I just discovered is after the error hooks are called on a socket disconnect, I had presumed that any messages that had failed to be sent during the timeout window were subsequently discarded.

This is not the case - socket.io adds them to a buffer and will resend when the connection is restored.
This is unwanted behaviour as I have already indicated to the user their action has failed e.g. a Signup.

Now I clear the socket.io sendBuffer on connect if detected a disconnect previously

Should this be something Feathers supports via an explicit option, or at least document?

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32131629/socket-io-stop-re-emitting-event-after-x-seconds-first-failed-attempt-to-get-a-r/32261523#32261523

import io from 'socket.io-client';
import feathers from '@feathersjs/client';
import socketio from '@feathersjs/socketio-client';
import authentication from '@feathersjs/authentication-client';
import paramsForServer from 'feathers-hooks-common/lib/services/params-for-server'
import {CookieStorage} from 'cookie-storage'
const socket = io((window.App && window.App.apiUrl) || window.location.origin, {transports: ['websocket'],
      upgrade: false});
const client = feathers();
let socketDisconnectError = false
socket.on('connect',function() {
  if (socketDisconnectError)
  {
    this.sendBuffer = []
    socketDisconnectError = false
  }
})
client.configure(socketio(socket,{timeout: 30000})); 
client.configure(authentication({
  storage: new CookieStorage({path: '/',expires: new Date().addDays(7) }),
  service: 'service/users'
}));
client.paramsForServer = paramsForServer
client.on('server.connection.error',(context) => {
  console.log('server.connection.error',context)
  // TODO: Send notification elsewhere that couldn't connect to the server

})
const ErrorMessageReplaces = [[/Timeout of/i,'Sorry.  We were unable to connect to our server or got no response.  Please try again later.']]

const processTransportErrors = (context) => {
  ErrorMessageReplaces.forEach((pair,i) => {
    if (context.error.message.match(pair[0]))
    {

      context.error.message = pair[1];
      context.app.emit('server.connection.error',context)
      socketDisconnectError = true
      return false;
    }
  })
  return context;

}

client.hooks({
  error: {
    all: [processTransportErrors]
  }
})


export default client;

[daffl]

I'm wondering if there should be a manual timeout anymore at all. This was originally needed if e.g. you called a service method that didn't exist but with the new Socket format you will get an error right away in that case.

[TimNZ]

I'm still on Buzzard/v3 so don't know how your v4 arch changes impact on this.

In my scenario, I am debugging/stepping through code on the server,
so a timeout occurs on the client for a service action,
and the message stays in socket.io send buffer queue, never removed, sent once connection has been restored.

[DaddyWarbucks]

I believe I am experiencing this as well. I have experienced the issue above as well as some odd 401's when paired with authentication.
I first noticed it as I was working on both a front end and a backend that were both running some dev script that auto restarted either on file change. I would randomly get 401's and odd behavior. I also have a mobile app that is currently using the socket transport. I understand the risks in doing so, but I have this app out in beta right now and wanted to see how the socket transport would hold up over mobile connections.

I created a basic repo where this can be reproduced easily: https://github.com/DaddyWarbucks/feathers-auth-test

[DaddyWarbucks]

I can confirm this is not a bug with feathers or feathers-authentication, as I initially thought. This is the natural behavior of how the socket.io client works. The fix mentioned above by @TimNZ works, or more compactly:

socket.on('reconnect', function() {
    socket.sendBuffer = [];
});

I was receiving authentication errors due to this because the sendBuffer happens outside the control flow of feathers-authentication.

More information can be found here:
https://github.com/socketio/socket.io-client/blob/master/lib/socket.js#L158
https://github.com/socketio/socket.io-client/blob/master/lib/socket.js#L332

[daffl]

The question would be if that should be included in the clients. I would think so, potentially together with #1537

[greyivy]

It would be helpful to be able to set the timeout option to null as well to disable it completely and use the built-in socket.io functionality.

[daffl]

This has been closed in the v5 prerelease via #1937